


Electronic letters contain less feelings

by two2ducks



Category: NCT (Band), WAYV
Genre: Abandoned Work - Unfinished and Discontinued, Angst, Best Friends, Best friend Taeil, Dong Si Cheng | WinWin-centric, Drinking, Falling In Love, Fluff, Fluff and Angst, Implied Sexual Content, Long-Distance Friendship, Long-Distance Relationship, M/M, Pen Pals, Penpal Yuta, Self-Doubt, Slice of Life, Slow Burn, unspoken feelings
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-03-11
Updated: 2019-07-12
Packaged: 2019-11-15 19:25:38
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 15
Words: 48,862
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18079478
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/two2ducks/pseuds/two2ducks
Summary: Sicheng gets off the bus, there aren’t any people at the stop, everyone who got off quickly disappears to different directions. The boy decides to sit on the bench until the next bus comes or Yuta answers him again. He nervously waits for the screen to light up again, fidgeting the phone around in his hands, glancing on the cars passing by. He could go somewhere nice this weekend, if Taeil gets better.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> The angst comes later oof

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm re-reading this and oh my, I promise you, my writing gets better as the story goes on!

Moving to a whole different country at the age of 21, knowing only the basics of their language - and not being the best at speaking English either- was not the worst decision Sicheng has made in his life so far. But having Taeil as his best friend might be it. Sicheng never understood how can a 24 year old can be this clingy and dramatic as he is in the moment. Right now the two of them are squeezed together on a large couch in their shared apartments living room, nothing romantic. Earlier this week Taeil had just simply brought up the fact that he got 2 tickets to a football game and when SIcheng did not respond by jumping in the air from happiness of attending a sports event, but instead shooting a quick “good for you”, the older one decided to annoy the younger until he gives in and agrees to spend his Saturday in an overcrowded arena, probably scrolling through his phone. And Sicheng actually might, because this is getting too much to handle. He was peacefully enjoying his Friday evening by watching some kind of new animated TV series everyone was talking about on the internet and slowly chewing on spicy instant noodles, when Taeil quickly approached him and dropped all his weight on top of Sicheng, squishing the boy between him and the couch. 

“Do you mind getting off of me?” Sicheng felt like suffocating and cursed at himself for using his last breath to such an useless sentence.  
“You know what you have to say to get me to leave.” Was all the eldest replied and when Sicheng just pretend that the weight on top of him is not here and continued to pay attention to the TV instead, Taeil started to sneak his arms around the youngers torso and nuzzled his nose against SIchengs chest.  
“Sichengie..” The arms around boys body tightened and Taeil started to rock himself from one side to another,  
“Sichengie...my bestest, my cutest, my most caring and precious friend,” another nuzzle and SIcheng started to fight back by trying to push himself out of elders grasp and off the couch.  
“My sweet child, can`t you take your old friend, who could easily get lost, to a simple football game. Ah, Sichengie, what if something happens to me?” If Taeil hadn`t managed to grow some muscles from his own football practices, Sicheng could have easily won over his shorter friend, but due to his lack of physical activities, he`s still sandwiched and missing most of the show on TV. Taeil hasn`t said anything after, which means he isn`t planning to leave Sicheng alone anytime soon. Name one more adult who would rather spend their Friday evening like this, than going out with friends or catching up on sleep.  
“Alright.”  
“Alright what?” The elder asked and lifted his head up to see if Sicheng really is talking to him  
“You know what.”  
“No, I don`t.”  
“Yes, you do. I`ve missed most of the show because of you.” The boy was trying to pull out any kind of sympathy from other, but no success.  
“Say it in a full sentence or you will later act as if we were talking about different things. I know you, Sichengie~”  
“I, Dong Sicheng, against my will, will take my old friend, Moon Taeil, to the football game this Saturday, just because he might get in some trouble because of his age.” The extra sarcastic tone Sicheng used should have at least a little bit annoyed Taeil, but the elder only nodded his head in approval and got up from his old place. He quickly took the bowl of noodles and stuffed his mouth with them.  
“Ew, they`re cold.” Taeil scrunched his face while chewing and turned to Sicheng offering some to him, at what the youngest only scoffed.  
“I wonder whose fault is that,” Sicheng ended his sentence with a small laugh and Taeil smiled back. Taeil might be annoying at moments like these, but Sicheng often admitted to himself that he liked the simple and soothing way they lived with each other.

  


* * *

  


Both males didn`t have much to do the following day, so yet again they were spending their youth laying on the big sofa while TV still is playing something in the background. Sicheng didn`t care about it at all, instead he was busy playing games on his phone. He had spent solid two hours like this. It definitely isn`t good for his health, but there`s not much to do anyways. In the middle of a passionate fight between Sichengs tiny little character and the dragon he`s been trying to kill for three times now, the phone beeped, signalizing about the low battery percentage. Oh god, not now!  
“Taeil, quick, pass me my charger, please.” Sicheng said louder than he himself expected, continuing to press his fingers to the phone screen with more force, in hopes that it might help with defeating the monster.  
“Wait a bit, I`ll quickly finish writing this.” The elder answered not sparing Sicheng a look, he stayed focused on the laptop screen in front of him and his fingers continued to flash over the keyboard.  
“No, Taeil, very important, now, I`m gonna die!!” Sicheng stretched his legs in order to kick Taeil. “Please, I can`t lose now!” After that he even faked a cry and as Taeil was about to reach for the charger, Sichengs phone screen went black. The younger let out a long sigh, while relaxing his tensed up muscles and tilting his head down in defeat. Four times. Four times and no success. If only Taeil would have given him the charger sooner. If only….  
“What are you writing?” Sicheng actually got curious of what so important is displayed on the old laptop.  
“Like a letter thingy, but on the internet, penpals.” As soon as the boys hands got the hold of charger, it was immediately plugged in and only when Sichengs phone lit up, displaying 0% of battery, it was dropped between the cushions and younger continued with questions.  
“So, like an email then?”  
“No, not quite. Like, the website matches you with a random stranger, based on your similar interests and then you just chat about stuff. But not in simple messages, more like letters as I said.” Taeil was scrolling through the text he had written just now, checking for mistakes, while Sicheng looked at it with interest. The idea of expressing himself to someone who doesn`t know him and probably won`t ever meet him in real life sounded very tempting. SIcheng managed to catch a few words and phrases showed on the bright screen: “I`m late again”, “Tuesday was bad”, “I`ll send you some photos”, “got a good grade tho”, “I should try it too”, “Saturday”, “football”.  
“How long have you been texting like this?” It was easy for the younger to guess that it has already been some time by the way how openly Taeil had described his week.  
“I don`t know, like four months or something.”  
“And who is this person?”  
“Some dude who actually was just writing project about penpals and… how serious relationship you can form through it or something like that. So, it was kind of an experiment at first, but he seemed pretty cool and we simply continued sending letters.” Taeil finished his sentence shrugging his shoulders. Mostly these letters consisted of stuff that had happened during the week or about their hobbies, sometimes they sent shorter letters to discuss about hot events happening at the moment.  
“Four months and you call him “some dude”?” Sicheng furrowed his brows, no way Taeil-who-knows-everything doesn`t know the others name.  
“He`s a foreigner and his name is kind of… hard to pronounce.” If the elder would have stopped searching for grammar mistakes so closely, Sicheng would have made a joke about it.  
“Mhmm.” The simple hum was enough of an answer between the two best friends.

  


* * *

  


Sunday came rather quickly after the lazy Saturday. Sicheng allowed himself to sleep through the first rays of sun shining inside of his light bedroom, hitting his honey coloured face and annoying him if he kept sleeping in his favourite position for too long. He rolled over on the other side with a grunt and took a peek at the brown clock hanging on the cream coloured wall. It`s something after 9 am. If he recalls right, the game starts at 3 pm, that`s still plenty of time for rolling around in bed, taking a cool shower and having a slow brunch. The boy closed his eyes and wrapped the brown duvet closer to himself, feeling how the sun has warmed it up. Nestling his head deeper in the same shade pillows, he thought that he could lay like this forever- the warm silence filling the whole apartment, the absence of hurry, the heat radiating around him. The sounds of cars passing by lulls Sicheng back to sleep.  
Until Sicheng shoots his eyes open and looks straight at the clock again. It`s 10:45 and Taeils alarm from the other side of the wall echoes it sound all around the peaceful suite. The younger doesn`t mind, he feels good and well rested, it`s time to wake up. Sicheng rolls out of his warm covers and stretches his arms and legs at the same time, waiting till at least one bone somewhere makes a cracking sound, and only when his left ankle satisfies his needs, the boy lets his body relax. Inhaling a deep breath, Sicheng rubs his exposed arm where the warm sun rays hit his skin and stares at a ceiling for a while. When he hears Taeil leave his room, he finally gets up, not minding to change from his black pyjama shorts and white t-shirt, leaving his room and making his way into the kitchen.  
Taeil always takes shower first and Sicheng second. Because Taeils showers are quick and the hot water warms up the space, just as the younger likes, and Sicheng makes the best morning coffee accommodated with some fresh toast, butter and vegetables.  
When the elder gets out of the shower, the scent of freshly brewed coffee hits him like it does usually.  
“Good morning!”  
“Good morning!” Sicheng shouts back, his voice still rasp from sleep, and hears Taeil slowly approaching. When Taeil walks into the kitchen, the younger places two dark cups of hot coffee on the table next to the plate full of cut up greens and takes a step aside to admire his work yet another weekend morning again.  
“The shower is ready,” Taeil is back in his pyjamas too, the big black shirt and long flannel pants making him look smaller than he already is, “wow, I`m feeling extra hungry today.” He rubs his abdomen and slips into one of the wooden chairs, reaching for a toast.  
“Don`t eat everything,” The younger has exactly as much time for shower as much time the coffee needs to cool down, before it gets too cold. “please.”  
“If I was at your place, I would be rushing to the shower now.” The younger chuckles instead of giving a proper sarcastic answer. And he does as said, quickly makes his way to the warmed up bathroom. Sichengs steps inside the airless room, closes the white door behind him and reaches for his towel to place it nearby the shower. He takes off all his clothes, placing them on a low stool, and ruffles his hair. Right before his hand is about to turn on the water flow, he hears muffled sounds of slow music filling their home.  
Sicheng steps below the cool water. As it hits his skin like dozens of tiny needles, he hums along the barely hearable music, rubbing his face to get it less puffy. He feels warm and chill, it`s perfectly balanced. It`s good, everything`s good. Sicheng shamelessly smiles.  
When the younger returns to their breakfast table, Taeil still sits there, slowly sipping his coffee and gazing outside the window in front if him, until Sicheng takes the seat opposite him, blocking the view.  
“I ate four toasts, so…”  
“So…?” Sicheng drags the “o” forming the same shape with his lips. He takes his cup containing the warm drink and lifts it to his lips as making an eye contact with the elder.  
“So you are left with two.” Taeil motions to the last pair of golden slices of bread with cup in his hand.  
“Well, guess who`s doing the dishes today.” Sicheng breaks the eye contact to pull the plate with toasts closer to him. Taeil chuckles as he leans his head on the other hands palm. The sun beams on his face, letting his pink cheeks and shiny nose pop up in all it`s glory, to what Sicheng can`t not pay a quick glance. 

  


* * *

  


The game wasn`t as boring as Sicheng thought it would be. They took the bus to arena and back, which luckily wasn`t crowded. Taeil told Sicheng pretty much anything you could know about the team the boy was supposed to support. The eldest was wearing teams jersey, while Sicheng settled with a blue shirt, still matching the teams colours. Before entering the arena, they stopped by a small convenience store, to grab two bottles of water and some snacks. Their team was in the lead after the first half. Taeil suggested to take some photos, because “ _not every day you attend this big of a sports event!_ ” Sicheng stayed in his seat and snapped some photos of Taeil posing in front of the big stadium on his phone. After the elder returned to his seat, he proceeded to take bunch of selfies of himself and his friend.  
The second half of the game was very intriguing – the other team managed to even out the score. It got every single person standing, including Sicheng and Taeil, who was jumping and screaming on top of his lungs, clutching onto SIchengs arm each time any of the teams neared the goalkeeper. In the last minute, their team scored a goal and Sicheng has never been to a louder place than that, even though, he himself was jumping from happiness.  
The game ended and on the way home, they stopped to get some pizza instead of serious dinner.  
When they arrived back home, Taeil excused himself and went straight to sleep due to exhaustion from the rollercoaster of a game. Sicheng wished him a goodnight and disappeared in his bedroom too.

You`d probably think that the football game was the peak of Sichengs Sunday, but no.  
As Sicheng laid in his bed, already changed back into his sleep wear, he fished out his red laptop out of his drawer and positioned it in front of him. The sudden bright screen made the boy squint his eyes. He rubbed them gently - he hadn`t realized how actually tired he was, until having to use more force than expected to pry his eyes open again. Sicheng stretched his left arm to reach the switch from his bedside lamp, he was laying on his stomach and had exactly zero motivation to get up from bed anymore tonight. The light helped to see the letter placement on the keyboard better.  
He knew exactly what to do, but the tiredness suddenly started to set in faster than he would like to. It felt like the soft fabric of his duvet was wrapping itself around Sichengs torso and his pillows were looking like the cosiest thing he has seen in a while.  
His fingers were flashing over the keyboard, the sooner he finished, the sooner he gets to sleep.  
He finished his work approximately 10 minutes ago, so the time should be around 11:35 pm. Instead of going straight to sleep, Sicheng decided to catch up on his favourite YouTuber activities, he couldn`t miss anymore videos, might as well unsubscribe then.  
He moves the cursor to check how much more time the video will go on, because the sleep is really getting to him and the light snoring he is able to hear even in his room means that Taeil is already deep in sleep.  
30 seconds. 30 more seconds and Sichengs day hasn`t been as bad as he thought. This day was very nice, maybe even too nice, maybe karma will get back to him soon. As Sicheng stares at the screen with void eyes, recalling what had happened today, the screen goes black and different video suggestions pop up on the screen. The boy clicks away from the fullscreen, dropping his eyes to the bottom right corner displaying 11:42 p. When the cursor moves up and right onto the close button, one of the tabs that Sicheng forgot to close start to change the colour every other second and he curiously clicks on it instead.

  


* * *

  


 

 _Hi!_  
_This is my first time here, so I`m not sure how do this in a way you wouldn`t drop me after a few letters lol. You`re actually the first person I got that is around my age. About me, hmm, I`m from China, but moved to SKorea for studies, which I may or may not are one step away from dropping. I live kind of in the outskirts with one of my friends. He`s pretty annoying at times, might drop him too. My main hobby definitely is dancing, but to make living out of it… uh oh. And with dancing, the music just comes along. I can cook, pretty decently some might say. I also tried to catch up on some mainstream animated TV series the other day, but that was a fail. Oh, and I`m not a 21 year old baby relaying on his parents, I work at a local café. I think extra shortly that`s about it…_  
_If you have literally nothing to answer to me, because I didn`t ask any questions (yet btw), I went to that football game today that everyone seems to talk about, we can chat about that… it doesn`t take much to notice that you`re a sports fan. lol_  
_I`m out for now, goodnight from my side!_  
_Hope to hear from you soon!_  
**_11:22 pm, ~Winwin_**

__

__

 

 _Hey Winwin!_  
_Is that really your real name? It must be pain in the butt to visit English speaking countries._  
_Yeah, most of the matches I`ve gotten are lonely middle aged men, how sad :( but with some exceptions, for example you :) True, I like sports quite a lot, especially football, not gonna lie, a bit jealous, because I had no chance of attending that game, bc I live in Japan. And don`t dare to call yourself a baby, I`m 23 and spend weekends at my parents, only because the rest of the days I stay in dorms lol I study too._  
_If by animated TV series you mean anime, we will be good friends, so what did you try to watch? I mostly like action ones, so oh please, don`t tell me you`re into romance stuff._  
_I also can cook, but like two, four at most meals, we could exchange some recipes until I run out of them lol._  
_It`s nice that our time zones match. I should get some more sleep too. This was kinda rushed, wasn`t expecting any more letters, sorry._  
_Goodnight, don`t let the bedbugs bite! :,0_  
_**11:45 pm, Yuta**_


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> this was supposed to be about 5 days, but endend up with only 2 days D:

Luckily to Sicheng, he didn`t sleep less than usual, due to the fact that the well-deserved spring break has arrived and that he got an evening shift every Monday. Just like every morning, the curtains are left open enough, so the sun rays could make their way into his room. His hands reach his cheeks and rub them gently, before the awaited, long yawn. There is still a lot of light coming from his window, meaning that the sun has not fully risen yet, so it is not even the middle of the day. The boy rolls his body over and glances at the clock, which displays exactly 10:05 am. Inhaling a deep breath and exhaling it right away, he gets up from his bed and opens the window to let some fresh air in. As he makes his way back to the welcoming bed, he reaches for his phone on the nightstand and falls back into the warm covers.  
Unlocking his phone, a notification from Instagram catches his attention, he uses it very rarely, so the tiny logo up in his notification bar looks very unusual. He clicks on it not minding to read what it says and the app instantly opens. The phone screen reveals a picture where he is tagged in, posted on his friends account, a selfie of him and Taeil from yesterday to be exact. He presses the tiny pink heart and only then examines the photo. They`re sitting closely, while people in the background seems to be chatting. Taeils on the right, holding his phone with one hand and the other seems to be resting in his lap. He is smiling widely, his pearl white teeth showing, meanwhile Sicheng is smiling with his lips tightly pressed together and his round, pinkish cheeks from heat probably are the main attraction to this picture. The youngest is leaning on the elders left side, resting his chin on the shoulder and showing a peace sign. Sichengs likes this picture. He didn`t really check them out yesterday, as soon as they reached home, he just sent the ones taken with his phone to Taeil. His fingers were already finding their way to the rest of photos. Clicking on the first tiny square, he started looking for the best one for a potential post for his own Instagram. After a few times of scrolling forth and back, he had to admit, Taeil chose the best picture and that meant no post for him, he can`t post the same picture.

Speaking of Taeil, a solid half a hour has already passed since SIcheng woke up, meaning that Taeil left for his work in library around two and a half hours ago. He didn`t hear the early alarm this morning. If Sicheng was this drained form yesterday, then Taeil probably didn`t bother making himself a breakfast, knowing him, he`d rather get 15 more minutes of sleep and then starve. Sicheng should make something nice for lunch before he heads out for his own day.

 

 _Oh!_ The boy pulls his laptop from the floor into his lap, opens the same nightstand drawer and takes one of the usb wires, quickly connecting his phone with laptop. A few clicks there and a few clicks here and he`s on the site Taeil introduced him to. After a few seconds, instead of the ugly outline of a persons portrait they dare to call a default profile picture, a heart-warming photo pops up of him and his friend. The same one Sicheng likes.

* * *

 

 _Good morning!_  
_True, I`ve had some strange encounters when my friends call me by my nickname, which is – Winwin, and the strangers look at me funny. Yuta sounds like a pretty regular name to me, meeting new people should be boring for you!_  
_Uhh, I don`t remember the exact name of that, yes, anime, but there were titans and people fighting them, flying around and stuff?? I believe it has a few seasons, because the one I started to watch was the second. Hm, maybe I should give a shot to romantic ones…_  
_Don`t be jealous, that probably wasn`t the last time on earth, that these teams were meeting! Do you play football or do you enjoy watching it?_  
_I think I`m going to cook some beef stew with rice today, want the recipe? It`s not that hard, just gotta be a little careful with the meat. I actually should start cooking if don`t want to be late to work, just wanted to send a quick response._  
_By the way, are you on your spring break? Whole week off! All the opportunities to stay in bed and not leave the house! What are your plans this week?_  
_**11:07 am, ~Winwin** _

* * *

Sicheng took a quick shower, with hot water this time, because the air in the bathroom wasn’t as warm as the boy is used to. As soon as he hung his towel to dry, he was off to start preparing the planned meal and a nice, big cup of coffee.  
When he had done cooking and placed his part in the bowl, he put the other half in a container and the container in fridge, with a yellow stick note on it: “Taeils lunch”

 

Then Sicheng proceeds to eat his meal and finish the now tepid coffee. Finally changing from his pyjamas into a pair of black skinny jeans and his brown work uniform shirt, the boy barely has any time left to brush his teeth and pack his bag, before he rushes out of the apartment.

 

The bus takes him little bit further into the city. Living outside the lively city, meant practically no traffic jams, and if you missed the earlier bus, the next one probably still will take you to your destination on time. Also, the bus that Sicheng takes, drives past Taeils workplace.

 

Sichengs shift starts exactly at 2 pm and ends at 8 pm. Nothing much happens, he takes peoples orders, waits for the food to be ready, carries it to tables, changes napkins, refills the empty sugar pots, takes the dirty dishes away. Mondays are pretty calm, a fresh new start for people to believe that they’ll start cooking meals at home, Wednesdays are the breaking point and the café is beyond busy for a workday.

 

The clock is 8:07 pm when Sicheng hangs his apron and leaves the building to go straight to the bus stop. The bus arrives at 8:15 pm and takes him home. The days are getting longer and the light of the day makes people happy for longer.

 

As closer he gets to his home entrance, he searches for the key, just in a case. But when he presses the handle down, the heavy door easily opens revealing the poorly lit space. The boy slides off his shoes and takes off his windbreaker, puts his bag on the low shelf.

 

“I’m back!” Sicheng makes his way further into the apartment, leaving the hall and entering the living room. The scent of food that comes from kitchen makes the boys stomach rumble from hunger.  
“Hey,” Taeil peeks from the kitchens door frame, “I’m making dinner. Thanks for the lunch.”  
“I’ll join you in a second.” The younger leaves to his room, to connect his phone to a charger and change into something more comfy, picking grey sweatpants and a worn out black hoodie. Making his way back to the kitchen to entertain the elder while waiting for the food to be ready, he turns on the TV, some random news channel for a background noise.  
“What are you cooking?” Sicheng steps inside the kitchen and immediately starts to prepare a cup of chamomile tea.  
“Hmm, originally it was supposed to be spicy chicken with vegetables, but now it looks like vegetables with mediocrely spiced chicken.” Taeil chuckles while mixing the slightly burnt greens in the pan “Make me some tea too.”

 

Later both males are found by the dinner table chatting about their day and enjoying the long awaited dinner. After finishing their meals Sicheng does the dishes, while Taeil looks for a game to play this time. The younger enters their living room with a cup of tea in each hand and a pack of chocolate cookies hanging between his teeth. They both get comfortable on the big sofa and with controllers in hand they spend the rest of their evening before going to sleep.

* * *

Waking up on Tuesdays is harder than on Mondays. The sun doesn’t shine so happily and the clock displays unpleasant time, 6:28 am, which means that there are two more minutes till Sichengs alarm is supposed to ring. Quickly pushing his eyes closed and nuzzling himself deeper into his soft bed, he tries to fall back asleep and use the last minutes at their best.  
Sadly, it’s no use. The alarm starts to ring sooner than expected, Sicheng quickly turns it off, in order to not to wake up his flatmate, and just like the other morning, one of the notifications on his phone stands out between the others.

* * *

_Good morning, I guess…_  
_Ah, how romantic, a young guy who works in a café, you must get plenty of girl numbers!_  
_How can you NOT know what Attack on titan is! You definitely should continue watching it, but don’t cheat, start from the first season!! I think I will rewatch some old anime, maybe you have some suggestions?_  
_I play football since like, uhhh… kindergarten I think? And I still do, it helps me to relax, it’s my favourite way to release the saved up energy and stress. And what about you and dancing?_  
_I overcooked my eggs yesterday morning, so if you have a recipe for not-burnt-baked-eggs, you can send it my way!_  
_Yeah, I’m on my spring break too, actually, we had a pretty good matching time, during school I reply like once in a week lol. So far my plans of doing homework early and reading some useful books have been replaced with video games and working out oof…_  
_Also, I’m currently at home, enjoying my time with my most loved one, her name is Rapunzel <3 **[attachment available]**_  
_Compliments are always welcome! Why aren’t you visiting your family?_  
_I should probably go to sleep, please don’t respond to this early in the morning, so the notification beep doesn’t wake me up lol_  
_P.S. Cute profile picture :]_  
_**3:14 am, Yuta** _

**_[attachment loading]_  **

* * *

Tuesdays are hard, because it’s the only day that Sicheng has an early shift and usually right after he would have five lectures and then he would get home exhausted, snack on something and head straight to bed.

 

But this time he only has to get through the early morning and the cold shower, he can take a nap after work. Getting out of his bed, he doesn’t bother opening curtains nor the window itself, 7 am outside is too cold for Sicheng, the sun can be insidious sometimes.  
Still not fully awake he makes his way to shower, by habit, takes his towel, takes off his clothes, steps into the warm shower, thinks about todays plans, steps out and gets dressed again. He makes the usual morning coffee, but not as hot as every morning, he doesn’t have time to wait for it to cool down. Eats his toasts and some chocolate sweets. He goes to his room to change, brushes his teeth, packs his bag and is off when the clock shows 7:30 am.

 

The cool air, the dark clouds and the wet ground is the first thing Sicheng notices, but forgets about it as soon as his buss reaches his destination.

 

Work goes by quickly, nothing special happens, it’s a little boring if Sicheng had to admit, but he’d rather have a boring job, than a drama filled one. _You must get plenty of girl numbers._ Yeah, right.

 

Before Sicheng heads home, he stops in a sweets shop, to buy something and replace the candy he ate earlier. He ends up with a few differently flavoured cookie packs and a strawberry cake, which definitely wasn’t his intention.

 

“I’m home” Sicheng arrives home after 3 pm, takes off his shoes and windbreaker. This time he takes his bag with him further into house, rather than leaving it in the hall.  
“Did you get lost on the way home?” Taeil greets the boy back from the living room “By the way, if you hurry up, then the lunch might still be warm.”  
“You cooked two times in a row? Is the world ending?” The younger laughs as he enters the same room Taeil is in and sits next to him on the sofa. “I went to that candy shop.” Sicheng opens his bag and reaches his hand in to fish out one of the cookie packs, Taeil closes his laptop to give full attention to his friend.  
“Yeah, turns out somebody had stolen my sweets.” As soon as the red plastic slightly appears out of the bag, Taeil takes it in his own hands and rips it open in seconds. “I wonder who could’ve it been…” Before offering some to Sicheng, the elder pulls out two cherry flavoured cookies and puts one in his mouth right away. “…maybe I should report it to the police.” Sicheng smiles at that and leans his head back, so it’s resting on the backrest of their sofa.  
“What if the criminal comes and confesses later?” Sicheng turns his head, so he could see what will Taeil do next.  
“Well, then…” Taeil shakes the cookie pack, as signalizing again for the other to take some, to what Sicheng only shakes his head and Taeil puts the cookies down, “… actually, I’m an undercover cop!” The elder forms his fingers like a gun, which reminds Sicheng of a child so much he laughs out loud.  
“Well, then I…” The boy sits up straight, makes the most serious face he possibly can and looks into his friends eyes deadly, pausing for a bit, making some tension, “…am going to have lunch.” When getting up he soothingly pats Taeils knee and disappears into the kitchen.

 

Sicheng eats his lunch alone, while Taeil keeps doing something on his computer. After that he goes to his room to change into the same sweatpants that he wore yesterday and a white t-shirt with some superheroes on it. He goes back to living room to collect his bag. He puts the rest of the cookies in the cupboard and the cake in fridge, noting that they should go grocery shopping soon.

 

After that he proceeds to clean up his room a bit. He throws the dirty clothes in the washing machine, changes his bedsheets from dark brown to deep blue, finally waters his last three alive plants, two of them being cactuses, vacuums the easily accessible places. He lays in his bed a bit, but the sleep won’t come to him, so he goes back to check what Taeil is doing.  
To his shock, his friend still is sitting at the same place on the piece of furniture with his laptop in front of him. Sicheng sees a few rain drops landing on the living rooms window.

 

“What are you doing?” Sicheng asks making his way besides his friend.  
“Writing some stuff, but I’ll be done soon.”  
“You’ve been writing some stuff for at least 3 hours.” The younger says, “Do you want some tea?”  
“What time is it then?” Taeils eyes grow wider from the slight shock as the clock on the screen displays 6:02 pm, “Oh… but yeah, I’d like some tea if I’ll have some company to drink it with.”  
Sicheng gets up from his place and goes on to his task. Two big cups, two tea bags, some sugar there, no sugar here. The rain intensifies and the dark clouds are now covering up most of the sky. Warm water.

 

When Sicheng returns back to the living room with tea, Taeil had brought out a few pillows and duvets, and the fresh air in the room means that the window is now slightly open. There’s a music channel turned on on the TV. Sicheng places both cups on the coffee table, one more to the right, the other one to the left, so they could identify which belongs to which.  
The younger wraps himself in the duvet, placing one pillow behind his back and one in his lap, and waits for Taeil to arrive. It doesn’t take long, when Taeil comes out of his room, Sicheng believes, in different clothes, now wearing almost black shorts and completely black, long sleeved shirt. Just as the younger, he wraps himself in a blanket, not minding to arrange the leftover pillows, and takes his cup in his hands.  
“So, what you’re going to do about it?” Taeil asks, taking a sip of his tea and scrunching his face, when he realizes it’s still too hot for his liking.  
“About what?” Is he still talking about the undercover cop thing?  
“About the cake.” Taeil places his cup back to it’s original place and crosses his arms, pretending to be suspicious.  
“I was here first, so if you want it, then go and get it. I’m not moving.” Sicheng says looking directly into others eyes, until he starts to get up. The boy expected at least some whining, but he guesses the cake is more important than bothering Sicheng. Strawberry cake, noted.  
While Taeil is wandering in the fridge, and the song on TV has a longer intro than the usual, Sicheng is left in a moment in silence. He hears raindrops hitting against the glass and the wind blowing straight into the buildings walls. The soft music starts playing and only then he notices how poorly the room is lit again.

 

And he feels, he knows, this is going to be one of those moments, the moments he tries to avoid at his best.

 

He takes his cup and blows out the breath he had been holding in on the warm drinks surface. Taeil comes back as Sicheng takes a long sip of his bitter tea and sits down way closer than he was before, bending one of his legs underneath him. Taeil wordlessly offers Sicheng to hold the cake, while he reaches for a few pillows, placing them around him, and wraps himself back in the blanket.  
Youngers hand is getting hot from holding the cup for so long, but when he tries to put it back down on the table, he can’t. It’s either the cake falls or Sichengs hand burns.  
Taeil notices the strange shifting of his friend, “Pass me your cup.” And the younger does. Taeil carefully puts one hands palm underneath the cup and wraps the other one around Sichengs warmed up hand and the cup. Suddenly there’s a loud thud from the outside, Sicheng uses this chance and quickly pulls his hand away, an even louder thunder follows afterwards and the rain gets heavier.  
The elder unbothered places the cup on the table. Taeil takes out the spoons from his and Sichengs cups, offering one to him. The younger slowly takes it and glances out of the window, as if the previous action deeply inside him meant nothing. He turns back when the elder forces his spoon through the pretty, pastel pink cake and Siicheng has to stiffen his hand.  
Taeil puts the spoon right to his mouth and now it’s his turn to look out of the window, “Mmm…” he puts the first piece of sweet content behind his lips and all Sicheng can do is watch as his rosy rosy lips start moving along with his round cheeks, “You’re not eating?”  
Stopping his thoughts, Sicheng takes a piece himself and quickly stuffs his mouth. “Damn, it’s good.”  
“Right?” Taeil answers with his mouth full. His hair looks pretty messy, Sicheng thinks he had washed it earlier, because the scent of his shampoo can’t go unnoticed if Taeil appears to be this close to him. Another sound of thunder, this time with a lightning.  
“I’ll turn off the TV.” And before Sicheng could protest, Taeil is already away to plug off the devices, leaving a cold spot behind him. Now they both are left with the sound of rain and sudden thunder. Taeil quickly makes his way back next to Sicheng, shuddering in the process. Maybe shorts weren’t the best choice.  
Sicheng continues eating the cake and paying more attention to the rain, rather the way too comfortable silence between the two males. Each time Taeil sighs, he can feel it on his exposed upper arm, each time Taeil changes his position, it seems like their duvets are morphing into one, because Sicheng can feel his knee brushing against his own. And that really distracts him from the rain. But it crosses some kind of a line, when the elder leans his head on Sichengs shoulder.  
“I’m so tired,” Sicheng knows Taeil is just clingy and wants to be comforted. Sicheng knows that he likes what he feels.

“I’m this tired on a break.” The elder chuckles and his breaths are closer to Sicheng than he thought. All he can do is nod, feeling his cheek brush against the others short, brown hair. Then no one talks again, they just continue eating cake, drinking tea and slipping deeper into the sofa.

  


After a while of staring out of window and trying to keep his eyes open, Sicheng realizes that it feels like Taeil on his shoulder gets heavier and heavier with each passing minute, until Sicheng realises he had fallen asleep. The soothing sound of rain continues and Sicheng admits once more, he could lay likes this forever. He knows it’s not right to feel like this towards someone, who you know, doesn’t feel like that towards you. But it’s not that often that Sicheng lets his guard slip, so he sometimes allows himself to give in. But as good as it feels at the moment, it just hurts him more in the long run, when these one sided moments are the only places to look comfort for.

 

By now it’s storming outside, the clock shows 9:57 pm. Taeil is lying in Sichengs lap. He probably tastes like strawberries.

* * *

_Good evening?_  
_I hope I’m not writing this too early and you’re finally up! Why do you go to sleep so late anyways?_  
_Yeah… I’m not THAT into animes, the oldest one I know probably is Death Note, so I guess you can watch that one._  
_Same as you, I’ve danced ever since I remember myself and I also use it as a way to express my emotions. But sometimes I want it too perfect and then it angers me even more lol_  
_Hm, well a good advice on your egg situation may be not leaving the stove while making them or you could start boiling them instead. For real, I can send you a few 3-or-so-ingredient recipes with eggs._  
_To be honest, I don’t know why I didn’t go home, just didn’t feel like it. How’s your hometown? And, wow, I really expected from a guy I’ve exchanged two letters with a photo of his girlfriend… she’s cute tho. I don’t have a pet, but I’d LOVE to get one, that doesn’t require everyday walks lol._  
_I haven’t planned a n y t h i n g this break, I’m just laying around and eating sweets, maybe I should start working out too… but where do you find the motivation to?_  
_I’m pretty sleepy and my flatmate is already snoring,_  
_goodbye for now._  
_**10:12 pm, ~Winwin** _

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> in the middle of writing this chapter i found where the right apostrophe had been hiding all this time  
> welcome '  
> goodbye `


	3. Chapter 3

When Sicheng opens his eyes, it’s still dark. The only light inside the room comes from the open window, the lampposts outside on the street are trying to shine through the millions of raindrops. The wind has calmed down, the sound of rainfall and heavy breathing in the room mixes together and quickly lulls the boy back to sleep.  
He’s about to doze off, when his phone rings from the other room. Sudden curiosity takes over him, it’s definitely late at night, he went to sleep relatively early and was already in the deep sleep, and judging by the absence of the sun, it can’t be morning hours either.  
Debating whether to get up and check what’s going on or to stay in the same position until sleep comes back to him, Sicheng spends solid three more minutes just staring at the ceiling with hooded eyes. His thoughts are interrupted by another buzz of his phone and a car passing by their house, blasting some pop music way too loudly for the current hour.

As soon as the sound of the car is no longer heard, Sicheng starts to slowly slide out from the warm covers, trying to carefully move the other body off of his side.  When one of the boys legs completely hangs over the edge of sofa and touches the chill surface of the wooden floor, cold trembles run all over his body and he releases an unpleasant grunt. Sicheng really hopes that his actions won’t wake Taeil up, since they’re not quite used to waking up in such a position.  Sicheng stiffens when the other starts shifting, he’s a little bit scared of what will happen next. If the elder wakes up, he can lie and tell that they just fell asleep like that and that he was just about to leave to go to sleep to his room. He can also pretend that he is still sleeping and that would give him the benefit of feeling Taeils reaction. Whichever route he would have chosen, Taeil only rolls on the other side, now facing the sofas backrest instead of the rest of the room. The younger uses this chance to easily get up from the sleeping position and slowly pull his duvet from where the elder slept on it. Succeeding, he puts the heavy duvet at the end of the furniture and quietly makes his way to his bedroom, carefully avoiding the planks that tend to crack.  
Slowly opening his door, he’s greeted with a completely dark room. Only then he realizes, he didn’t open the curtains when he returned home, nor while cleaning up. Blindly, he searches for the light switch and as soon as his palm hits the familiar surface, he quickly presses it, but the room stays as dark as before. Sicheng repeats his action and nothing still is happening. _Has the electricity gone out?_  
Throughout the black room, using only his hands, he finds his phone, without stepping on anything and feels glad that he cleaned up earlier.  
Pressing one of the buttons on his phone, which was still left charging, to turn it on, his suspicion is confirmed, as the phone shows no signs of charging. He plugs the charger out from the outlet and throws the wire on his bed. While typing in his password, he easily notices the cause of noise and, not bothering to check the rest of notifications, he clicks on the familiar logo.

 

* * *

 

_Good morning?_   
_You know, if you go to sleep late and wake up late, then you don’t lose any sleep anyway, so what’s the point on going to sleep early? Nah, but the real reason is that I’m friends with this one guy who spends most of his life in Chicago and we don’t meet up often in real life AND our time zones are pretty different…_   
_Ha, I was with my eggs the whole time! But my attention might have been somewhere else tho. About those egg recipes, I don’t mind if you send me some, unless it takes more than 15 minutes, to cook them, then you can keep your secrets to yourself._   
_Dude, being at home IS THE BEST!!! But I kind of understand, for you it’s not as easy as it is for m gfelwu4g5h44ķ;;lk;’p_   
_pppppppppppppppppppppjjjj_   
_**3:32 am, Yuta**_

__

* * *

 

_As it is for m…_ me? That’s probably the right guess, but what the fuck happened to Yutas letter afterwards. The realisation that this is the first time for Sicheng to think about his letter buddy as Yuta, not as _him_ or _that guy_ , kicks in kind of later alongside with the remembrance of the second letter. It’s also from Yuta. Who else. Sicheng hasn’t accepted any new message requests, since at the start he just wants to see if this thing is worth his time.

 

* * *

 

 

_DUDE I’M SORRY ABOUT THE PREVIOUS LETTER, MY DOG STEPPED ON MY PHONE_   
_my cute dog*_   
_Anyway, it’s easier to me..? I think I finished it there. I’m from Osaka. It’s pretty far from Tokyo, but I like it here, I’ve spent all my life here and the food here is GREAT. Plus if you ever come to visit, there’s place which is like, a small Korea. You know the drill, the city centre is full of colourful lights and signs, suburbs are filled with way too many small houses and tiny gardens at some places, meanwhile the countryside has different colour fields and mountains next to each other. It’s pretty. What is your city back in China like?_   
_Dude, I have no luck with girls and I don’t get it?? I’m a sportsman, very well built, not to brag, and like, handsome, I think? And the only girl that I have is my dog._   
_Get a cat? They’re pretty much a dog, but don’t require walks 5 times a day and don’t bark all the time. Not to sound weird, but if you were an animal, I think you could easily pass as a cat, just by your looks._   
_I’m actually thinking about starting new work out plan once this break ends and if you want to join me that’d probably be fun! Tbh, idk, I’ve just been doing physical activities for most of my life…_   
_At least you and your friend probably have separate rooms, while at the dorms I’m stuck with a guy who looks like an angel, but snores like a tractor._   
_I’m off to enjoy some peaceful sleep, bye_   
_**3:38 pm, Yuta**_

****

* * *

 

 

Sicheng locks his phone and puts it in his pocket, he’ll answer to him later. Without a thought of staying here in his bedroom and going back to sleep in his  own, large bed, the boy makes his way back to living room, slowly closing the door behind him. He yet again tries to avoid the creaking wooden planks as he makes his way to the sofa. For a moment he stops right in front of the large piece of furniture with a male laying on top of it. It’s strange how Sicheng refers to himself as _a boy_ , but when it comes to Taeil, he’s _a male_. Sure, they have an age difference of a few years, but even if not that, as much as Taeil might be playful, childish and annoying, the younger sees him as something he has yet to become. To Sicheng, the elder is someone who will always know the way out of complicated situations, a person who will always come to help others, a person who Sicheng can truly trust and he hopes that the other feels even just a tiny bit the same towards him. Sometimes it truly feels like Taeil knows everything, but only expresses it when it is really needed, instead of bragging about it all the time. Even though Sicheng is taller than his friend, they’ve come to various situations where Taeil is the one protecting them, whether it is some suspiciously looking guys during their late night summer walks or somebody who mocks the younger for his language skills.  
Sicheng sits down on the end of sofa, still looking at the Taeil. He can’t understand if his head is filled with everything or nothing at the moment.  Why is he always letting his posture and self-control fall so easily at times like these? He knows that in the morning he won’t bother thinking about what is he doing right now, but, _fuck_. Sicheng puts his palms against his head and cups his cheeks. His face is getting warm and his eyes start to hurt, he won’t cry. He rubs his inexistent tears away and sharply stands up, grabs the blanket with such force, that it immediately unfolds. He lets himself fall against the soft surface without a thought about waking someone else up and curls into a ball, pulling the duvet to himself as close as possible. Sicheng doesn’t want to think about things right now. All he needs to remember is to write the letter back.

 

* * *

 

 

When Sicheng wakes up for the second time today, the room is filled with light and the buzzing sound from cars outside, if you listen closely enough, you could hear parents dragging their children to kindergartens and school.  It’s Wednesday, almost the middle of the week, which means an evening shift and a dance practice after that.  
Before deciding to fully wake up, the boy rolls around in the warm covers, trying to find a position where the sunlight isn’t hitting his eyes and his clothed body doesn’t feel too hot.  
Not feeling very comfortable in the current state, he stretches his legs out and the grey sweatpants appear from underneath the blanket. His bare feet feel unpleasant as the air in the room is colder than inside his duvet-cave. When he pulls his legs back, close to him, Sicheng realises, that he’s left alone on the sofa. The sudden thought makes the boy sit up quickly and take a look around the room. There’s no sign of his friend. There’s no excess duvet, no more pillows than his own, the cups of tea have disappeared alongside with the elders laptop.  
Sicheng gets slightly scared and before he can process his next move, his lips and lungs start to work on their own, “Taeil?” the boy says it loudly enough, so it would be heard throughout the whole apartment. The way Sicheng said his friends name sounded so desperate and scared. A few seconds pass before some shuffling is heard from the bathroom. Sicheng sighs heavily, when Taeil appears, peaking from the door frame, with shaving foam covering half of his face. The look on his face looks worried, his eyes are wide and mouth open.  
“Is everything okay?” The younger realises that he has nothing to answer and stares back at his friend blankly, not a single word comes to his mind. “Bad dream?” Taeil continues.  
Sicheng quickly picks up and nods his head, pulling the covers closer to his chest.  
“Do you want to talk about it?” The elder has been disturbed from his morning routine and there’s nothing to talk about.  
“No.” Sichengs mouth is dry and his throat hurts slightly, he thinks about the window they left open last night. Taeil doesn’t move from his place though, as if waiting for a more certain answer. Sicheng smiles at him and that seems to work, he can see how Taeil breathes out and smiles back before disappearing back into the bathroom.

 

* * *

 

 

_A sure good morning!_  
 _Osaka and Chicago…how did you two managed to meet?_  
 _Yeah, flights aren’t cheap and to add I’m not a fan of flying on a plane, so I’m relaying on my parents to pay me a visit lol I’m coming from Zhejiang, if that rings any bells to you. There’s a lot of hills and like thousands of islands along the coastline.  Probably the best thing in the province is the riverside themed town by Yangtze River delta, haven’t been there IN A WHILE. Got like bunch of temples and lakes._  
 _I can give you advice on eggs and stuff, but romance is not my field. I’ve settled with the plan, that I’ll finish my studies first and then look for tHe LoVe Of My LiFe lol maybe girls like guys with more stable life than ours. Don’t they like older men and stuff?_  
 _To be honest, getting a cat doesn’t sound awful. I should discuss about it with my flatmate. Looking after a tiny kitten would be harder than a grown cat, what if we forget about it in the everyday rush :(  If you don’t like to look after your dog, why did you get it hmm? And if you were an animal, not judging by the looks, I’d say you are a… sloth? But like a sporty sloth or something._  
 _You know… I wouldn’t mind starting to do some physical activities, but I haven’t really done anything since high school, so your plan probably won’t fit me. But if you have anything easier in mind, send it my way, we could try something._  
 _You know, THANK GOD I managed to find someone to share an apartment. I can’t imagine sharing a tiny room with unknown people. Yeah, it might sound as if I can’t hear the snoring at all, but it’s the only thing you can hear at 3 am in our apartment. I bet you’re exaggerating, you just should go to sleep earlier and by the time he starts to snore, you’ll already be in deep sleep. :P_  
 _By the way, I’ll send you the recipes once I gather all my strength to write them._  
 _**9:43 am, ~Winwin**_  


 

* * *

 

Sicheng manages to wake up quickly and goes straight to the kitchen to make his usual breakfast for two. Taeil has another free day, he works two days and then has the next two off, so today they both sit by their table, the sun is shining brightly through the wide window after the strong storm. They eat their breakfast just as every other day. After that the younger finally takes a cold shower in the warm room and changes into his work clothes straight away. He packs his bag, throwing in some more clothes to change into during the practice and after it. He still has some time left before he has to head out to the bus stop, so Sicheng decides to look for a new game to play. Thinking back to his previous chats, in the search bar he types “cats” and the internet is quick to give him bunch of appealing choices. Not paying much mind to it, he downloads the first one and leaves for work.

 Just as Sicheng expected, this Wednesday shift doesn’t go by as quickly as other days do. When he gets to his workplace, most of the tables are taken and some people are siting and patiently waiting for their orders. The boy rushes to put his stuff away and start with his duties. Some people complain about the time it takes for the food to prepare, some don’t like how the meal tastes even though they fully knew what they were ordering, small children running around and talking louder than the person ordering food. Sicheng can feel how the annoyance is slowly building up, but somewhere deep he knows, he will be able to release all his frustration soon and it makes him get through the rest of the evening and, once the clock reaches 8 pm, Sicheng is quick to leave the building.

Sicheng always heads to the studio by legs. He always stops at the same convenience store to get some snacks for him and the others before the practice. Even though the air outside is getting warmer as the spring is slowly reaching its full bloom, the pleasant hot air stream that hits his body as soon as he opens the small door is very pleasant. Grabbing a few bags of chips, some fruits and a bar of chocolate, he quickly pays for his products and rushes to his friend who is probably already waiting for him.

Even before opening the main hall, he can see Ten already stretching with slow music playing in the background.  
Sicheng hasn’t even fully stepped in the room when Ten whines loudly “You’re late!” The shorter boy rapidly stands up and makes his way to Sicheng, he already knows what’s happening and stretches his hand out to give the bag to the other boy. Ten takes it without hesitation and unzips it open to check what tasty Sicheng has brought this time.  
“Yeah, Wednesdays aren’t fun, y’now.”  
“I’m taking the chocolate, you can have the fruits.” The other gives back the bag to Sicheng and the younger quickly changes from his work clothes to something more comfortable.  
“Have you found a song?” Sicheng finishes changing and sits on the floor, grabbing a bag of chips with him.  
“To be honest, no.” Ten joins the other on the floor and continues with his stretching while munching on chocolate.  
Sicheng laughs and opens the bag of chips, “Me neither,” putting a large chip in his mouth, the younger spreads his legs and tries to reach over his foot with his right hand, “who would’ve thought that finding a good song is the hardest part?”  
Ten chuckles back and mirrors Sichengs movements, “I wanna something, like, upbeat, but sweet at the same time.”  
Sicheng changes his hand and stretches forward to the other leg, “Are there any good new songs?”  
“No, I don’t want a new song. I want something that we already know.” Ten stands up, putting the chocolate bar away, motioning for Sicheng to follow him.  
The boy stays on the floor and stuffs his mouth with chips. “Yeah. So, nothing serious today?”  
“Nah, let’s leave all the thinking to Taeyong.” The elder goes back to Sicheng and sticks ouot his hand to help the other get up, “let’s just freestyle to some pieces.”  
Sicheng takes Tens hand and gets up with a grunt, “Where is he anyway?” he asks wiping his hands against his black pants.  
“He had to do something, he didn’t really tell me.” Ten shrugs, “Let’s start to do something or I will fall asleep.”

 

* * *

 

 

Saying goodbyes to each other and going different ways almost marks the end of Sichengs day. The weather feels pretty nice, beside the fact that’s a bit too cold for the boys liking. Sicheng stuffs his hands in the windbreakers pockets and waits for his taxi that will take him home. All he wants right now is to lay in his warm bed and drift to sleep.  
As he takes out his phone to check the clock, the taxi arrives and he gets in, 10:39 pm. The ride is relatively short and quiet, he pays for the ride and rushes to his apartment.

Silently unlocking the door, Sicheng arrives home. There’s no sound in the whole place, Taeils shoes stand by the entrance, so he must be already sleeping. Not bothering to do anything else, SIcheng takes off the outdoor clothes and makes his way to his room. The door to the elders room is closed, confirming the earlier assumption.

As soon as Sicheng steps in his room, he throws off the rest of his clothes, not worrying about changing into pyjamas, and dives deep inside the blue covers on top of his bed. He connects his phone to the charger and for the last time checks the notifications.

The dim light from outside shines into the dark room coming out of the window that has been left open. The clock shows 11:21 pm when Sicheng falls asleep.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> this isn't going the way i want it , stay tuned


	4. Chapter 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> tbh i don't like this chapter D:

Someone outside really doesn’t seem to care about people who are still sleeping and is screaming at someone through phone. It doesn’t take much for Sicheng to get tired of it and use it as a reason to get up. Unlike other mornings, the boy immediately leaves his room, but only because he needs to use bathroom.

As Sicheng is about to start making himself some coffee, he hears another door opening in their apartment and without a “good morning” Taeil starts to loudly mock the person on the phone.  
“ I CAN’T BELIEVE YOU COULD GIVE UP SO EASILY. I THOUGHT ALL THE WORK WE PUT IN MEANT SOMETHING TO YOU,” The elder enters kitchen and continues with his acting, “UNBELIEVABLE. YOU COULD’VE WAITED AT LEAST ONE MORE WEEK, BUT NO!” He walks up to Sicheng, as if the boy is the aim of all this talking, “WHAT ABOUT THE REST OF GROUP? WE AREN’T THE ONLY ONES IN THIS WORLD Y’NOW!”  
Sicheng starts lightly chuckling, “I know, and now all of our neighbours do too.”  
“You heard it too?”  
“Who didn’t?” Sicheng takes another mug form the cupboard and prepares another coffee.  
Taeil silently laughs back and moves to lean on the table, waiting for his coffee. “What’s for breakfast?”  
Sicheng takes a sharp turn around to face the other, “Grocery shopping.”  
The elder whines at the idea of leaving the house this early, “No way we don’t have anything.”  
“I can offer you some fruits from yesterday.”  
“Nah, not feeling it.”  
Sicheng brings both cups to the table and sets them next to Taeil, “Well then, more for me.”  
The elder wraps his hand around the cup, noting that it’s still way too hot for drinking, “I’ll go take a shower.”

 

 

* * *

 

 

They go grocery shopping before eithers work starts, meaning they left the apartment around 8:30 am, which, apparently, is way too cold for Taeil, who keeps complaining about it the whole time.  
Spending way too much money, because of the amount of sweets that were placed in the cart, with 3 full bags with food they take a bus back, when the elder brings up an idea, “I’ve been thinking about getting a drivers license. Imagine, no more buses, no more people around you all the time.”  
“And where will you get a car?”  
“Yeah, it stops there.”

When they get come, Sicheng prepares some food before they head out. Thursday at work is a level easier than Wednesday. The boy gets home second and is greeted by already made cup of teas and a game showing in their TV screen. The evening goes as it usually does, they both play games and eat sweets instead of dinner. Per usual, when it’s 10:30 pm, Sicheng is almost ready to go to sleep. Slightly bothered by the lack of notification on his phone, he says a final goodnight to Taeil and heads straight to his bed.

 

* * *

 

 

Friday mornings go exactly as others. Wake up, coffee, breakfast, shower, do nothing useful, head to work. Fridays are nice, because people want to enjoy the end of the week and tend to order many different drinks and sweets. Get back home.

8:41 pm is the cursed time, when Taeil starts to plead for Sicheng to go out for some drinks with the rest of their friends. Maybe Sicheng would have said yes straight away, if only Taeil wouldn’t have started his long speech about how important it is to enjoy all their free time doing something fun, as if most of the time they don’t spend on a large couch with a TV in the background.  
8:53 pm is the hour when Sicheng finally agrees after Taeil went back to calling him _Sichengie~~_ and _Winwinie~~_ and agreed to pay for the taxi back home, on a condition, that they will go home sooner, if the youngest will want it.

There’s still no letter though and Sicheng would lie if he said that it doesn’t matter to him. _Yuta_ is just some stranger on the internet. Maybe he got bored and decided that it’s easier to end this just by not answering or maybe something happened to him. Maybe he lost his phone. And computer. It shouldn’t matter, but the letters had already creeped their way into Sichengs routine.

He quickly gets ready, changing into some black skinny jeans and a patterned button up shirt. The boy stands in front of a mirror and combs his fingers through his hair to make it look puffier. Spraying some hairspray and tiny bit of perfume, he is almost ready, meanwhile Taeil hasn’t left his room ever since they spoke.

Sicheng lightly knocks on the others bedroom door, “Taeil?” not waiting for an answer he starts to slowly open the door.  
“Yeah?” Sicheng is already peeking in his friends room, “I’ll be ready in a minute.” Taeil throws off the jacket he was wearing just a second ago and puts a different one immediately, checking himself in the mirror.  
The younger didn’t expect such a sight in front of him. Taeil is wearing black jeans, just like him, a white t-shirt is tucked in the pants and you can see the golden buckle of the belt.  
“Do you think it looks better with the black or the brown one?” Tail turns to Sicheng as if posing and looks into his eyes hopefully. Sicheng can only notice that he has styled his hair upwards and his eyes look bigger due to the almost unnoticeably drawn eyeliner.  
It takes a minute for Sicheng to finally answer, “I think the black leather one looks great.” Taeil smiles back as if accepting the others choice and moves to reach for the jacket he took off before. It hits the younger about how little did he prepare, comparing to how much his friend did, “I like your shirt. Haven’t seen it before.”  
“Yeah, I bought it like last week.”

 

* * *

 

 

They take the last bus to city centre, meeting Kun, who enters the vehicle at one of the stops. The rest of the group is already inside when they arrive at their destination. Taeil is waffling a lot and constantly gains not only Sichengs and Kuns attention, but also observation from people around them.  

They enter the club and start looking for the table that Ten had already reserved for them. It’s not as easy as it might to seem, it’s Friday after all. Young people are bumping into each other, not seeing anything, as the bright lights and smoke mix together and blocks any view in front of their eyes. The loud music makes people around them scream on top of their lungs to get each other’s attention. The whole mess makes Sicheng reach for one of his friends arms to cling into, so he wouldn’t stay back and get lost. Under his fingers he can feel the tough leather material. His strong grasp doesn’t last long as his hand starts to slide down, away from the others arm. It feels as if the crowd is trying to swallow especially Sicheng and the rest are continuing to have fun. When he has almost released his grasp, a strong hand pulls the boy close to his body and wraps it’s arm around his shoulders. It doesn’t take long for Sicheng to recognise that it is Taeil, since the scent of his perfume and hair gel is the first thing the younger focuses on.

Now they easily make their way to the rest of their group. There’s exactly three more seats left free. Sicheng sits next to Taeyong and Taeil takes the place on his other side.

“So, what were you doing on Wednesday?” Sicheng asks as he leans closer to Taeyong.  
“I was babysitting one of my friends kid.”  
“Since when _you_ are a baby sitter? And why you couldn’t just tell it to Ten?”  
Taeyong shoots a glare to him, meaning that there was something more behind his excuse, “You gotta do, what you gotta do.”  
Sicheng chuckles back at the response and tries to pick up on the conversations that are happening at the table. They’re mostly discussing about how has everyone’s week been and plans for the upcoming one. Somebody mentions that the spring break is almost over and all the young adults whine and sigh together.

Nothing much happens until the first round of cocktails appear on the board. Sicheng isn’t the best when it comes down to alcohol, so he settles with a simple “Cosmopolitan”. To his shock, Taeil gets a “Black Russian” and, when he secretly takes a sip before anyone else, the elder shows no reaction to the strong drink in front of him. Everyone lifts their glass and they all stretch out their hands to meet them in the air, cheers and laughs are exchanged.  
The glasses are quickly emptied to get light headed as soon as possible. Sicheng gets the same drink again and this time sips it without a hurry. Taeyong next to him doesn’t seem to be happy about the amount of alcohol he has consumed in the short amount of time, as his glass is empty for the second time.  Sicheng listens as Doyoung tells his friend about best ways to avoid traffic in the early mornings. Doyoung lives not far from the city centre and owns a car. His family is pretty wealthy, but he himself has managed to stay humble. His family wants him to become a doctor and they have big expectations for him, so the raven haired male is often stressed and tends to have a few drinks time to time. One time Sicheng went out together with Doyoung, the elder was blabbering a lot that evening and tip-toed around the fact that he had a crush on Taeyong. Sicheng doesn’t know if he remembers it or not, so he won’t step in their conversation.

On the boys other side, Taeil now has a way lighter drink than before. He places the black straw between his lips and sips his iced tea with vodka without lifting the glass from table and returns to his conversation with Ten and Jaehyun.  For a while Sicheng thinks about joining them in the talk, he blanks out for a moment. He comes back when Kun leans in front of his view on the other side of the table. Sicheng startles a bit, Kun smiles at Sicheng and he smiles back. They haven’t met in a while. Kun already has his life sorted, he finished his studies last year and now works for a company somewhere in the city, he has the same girlfriend since, like, high school, if Sicheng recalls right. They even are planning to get married. The blonde is also from China, but he moved here way sooner. It started off with a high school exchange program and he decided to stay here, because he found a great university.

Ten suggest to go dancing, it’s been some time since Sicheng actually went dancing in the club, instead just for the drinks, but he doesn’t mind. When they reach the dance floor and find a small space where to squeeze in the massive crowd of young people, Sicheng starts to easily move in the rhythm of the song that’s blasting through the speakers everywhere around them. He doesn’t feel nearly as awkward as Doyoung does right now, he’s a dancer after all. They stay there for a few more songs, until someone complains about the lack of alcohol in their system and all of friends return to the table and order another round of drinks. Sicheng gets a “Strong martini” and so does Taeil. Is everyone planning to get awfully drunk tonight?

 

* * *

 

 

After finishing their drinks again, they return to the crowd by the DJ. Sicheng can’t see as clearly as earlier, he trips a few times and laughs to himself each time. The people around them are still squeezing him, but he doesn’t mind as much, the boy himself bumps into strangers and mouths unnoticed “sorry-s”.

Ten offers to order some clean vodka shots, Sicheng and Jaehyun agree and return to the table, with Kun just tagging along. Sicheng barely feels how actually strong the drink is, he quickly gulps it and feels his throat slightly warm up. The four sit at the table and are laughing more than talking. None of them can really keep the track of what are the conversations about and get into fake fights when someone interrupts their speech. Sicheng gets tired after a while and rests his head in the palm of his hand. He sits like that for a while, lightly swaying from one side to other and slowly blinking as tiredness creeps into him, when Kun unexpectedly starts a silent conversation with him,  
“So… what’s up with him?” Kun grins at the end of his question.  
“What’s up with who?” Sicheng leans in closer, so his friend could hear what he is saying.  
“Oh, no need to pretend.” The boy truly can’t wrap his head around who is Kun talking about, “Taeil you dummy. He’s all dressed up and this time he didn’t stop after his first drink.”  
Sicheng thinks about it. Yeah, Taeil usually doesn’t bother putting on extra-stylish clothes and style his hair, but doesn’t everyone want to look extra good time to time? _And_ get drunk time to time?  
“And he’s pretty chatty this time. Did someone dump him or is he trying his luck tonight?” Kun elbows Sichengs ribs hinting on something that the boy can’t quite pick up.  
“I don’t know,” the younger drags slowly, “I don’t think he has been seeing anyone…” Sicheng thinks back to all the time Taeil has spent with his laptop recently, but that’s about it, no phone calls, no regular texting on the phone, no dates as far as he knows.

Phone, Sichengs phone.

Checking his jeans front pockets first, not finding anything, and then the back ones, Sicheng pulls out his phone.  
“That’s  a pretty dangerous place to keep your stuff,” Kun starts a new talk, “your jeans must be tight as fuck for it not to fall out.”  
“That’d be sad if somebody stole it.” Sicheng mindlessly answers, trying to unlock his phone, but he keeps messing up the pin code.  
“No, no, no, you’re born in 1997, not in 1998.” Kun looks closely at the Sichengs phone screen as the boy types in 1994 and gets his code wrong again. The blonde takes his phone and blinks a few times to clear his eyesight and carefully types 1997 and Sichengs phone unlocks.

“How did you know my password?” Sicheng asks, taking his phone back and scrolling through all the new notifications.  
“Your passwords are too easy, dude.” Kun rests his head on Sichengs shoulder and follows the youngers process on the phone.

Sudden excitement comes over the boy, when the _long_ awaited notification has arrived.

 

* * *

 

 

_Can we move on to Hey?  
Uhhh… Johnny and I go back to high school times, when he came to Japan as an exchange student and I might have used him to practice my English, but he turned out to be a cool guy._

 

* * *

 

 

“I came here as an exchange student too.” Kun mumbles, still on the boys shoulder.  
“Mhm.” Sicheng hums as if approving the fact.

* * *

 

 

_I did a quick research and your home town seems like a decent place for tourism. Might go there someday when I’m rich and traveling around the world._   
_Whose field is romance anyway. Maybe I should think more like you, but then again, isn’t it nice to have someone, like, to share everything with and be cute and stuff? Yeah, dating a student who lives in the dorms doesn’t sound as fun as dating a guy who lives on a private yacht. But I believe there are people who are looking for something less, let’s hope for the best._   
_I got a dog, because dogs??? Are?? The best creatures in the world? Getting a pet is cool, if I could, I’d bring my dog to dorms with me. Have you talked about the cat yet?_

 

* * *

 

 

“What’s with the cat?”  
“I’m thinking about getting a pet, but I have yet to ask Taeil.”  
“You kind of look like a cat.”  
“Yeah, I know.”

 

* * *

 

 

_I’ll try to look or come up with something for you. Even running is a good exercise and I truly believe that anyone can do that, but an important part is also what you eat. Even tho I live off everything that’s available at any fast food restaurant, I try to drink enough water lol. Sometimes I eat salad._

 

* * *

 

 

“I’m hungry.” Sicheng sighs, he could really have a large dinner right here and now.  
“Yeah, me too.”

 

* * *

 

 

_I’d love to get an apartment, but even if I shared it with somebody, it would still be pretty expensive. And in the dorms, most of your friends are at the same place, but sometimes it’s bad. I once pissed of one of my old friends and I had to keep our door locked 24/7 and we made a secret knock-code, so I could know, that whoever is behind the door won’t kill me._

 

* * *

 

 

“I used to live in the dorms.” Kuns voice sounds sleepy. Sicheng rests his own head on top of his friends.

 

* * *

 

 

_What’s the point of fixing my sleeping schedule, if the studies fuck it up every other week? How have you actually managed to make yourself fall asleep so early????_   
_Might be jealous._   
_**11:56 pm, Yuta**_

 

* * *

 

“Yuuutaaaaahhhh…” Kun drags slowly while yawning and stretching his arms.  
Sicheng repeats in the same manner, “Yuuutaaahhh,” it's strange to say his name out loud.  
“Won’t you answer him?”  
The younger lifts his head and places his phone on the table, “I think… later.”  
Kun doesn’t respond anything and a comfortable silence settles between the two friends. Jaehyun and Ten seems to be in their own world and pay no attention to the other friends, as they don’t notice Kun and Sicheng slowly dozing off.

Sichengs body feels so relaxed and he barely feels the weight on his side, he sluggishly blends together with their seat and rests his head against the wall behind it. His head feels full, he knows the song that is playing right now. The lyrics are in his head, but he can’t remember the name of the song, he quietly hums along.  His eyes are wandering around the different faces, as much as he can make them out, his eyesight definitely has gotten worse from the drinks and the ringing in his ears is not helping to concentrate.  
But it doesn’t take much from Sicheng to find the familiar brunet among the dancing crowd, the view from the top tables is pretty good. Taeil is dancing with Taeyong and some other people Sicheng can’t recognise, he wants to go down there and join them, he wants to dance with Taeil, but his body feels glued to the furniture. From afar the boy can see his friend laughing with others and whispering something to Taeyong time to time.  
Taeil looks really good tonight. He doesn’t wear leather jackets often, but he should, he looks very harsh and hot in them. His styled hair has been messed up from all the moving and some strands are sticking to his sweat covered forehead. He flows so freely between all the people and Sicheng knows that he’s drunk, Taeil gets very open and talkative when he’s not sober. Whereas the younger can go both ways: Sicheng can have a great time, not caring if he will remember anything or Sicheng gets sleepy and sentimental.

Feels like today is the second option.  
Especially, when some girls approach his friends and start chatting with them, later moving the conversation by the bar and getting some drinks. They don’t come to the table though, they stay there, sitting on the stools, away from the useless conversation between Ten and Jaehyun, almost fully asleep Kun and Sicheng, who, slowly blinking, stalks them.

Taeil is 24, what does Sicheng think? That he will stay single forever or that he will suddenly have a crush on his flatmate? It’s obvious how good-looking Taeil is, how good his manners are towards anyone, how sweetly he can talk, at some point anyone could fall for him.  
They clink their glasses all the time and laugh loudly enough for Sicheng to hear. Sicheng can make Taeil laugh too, even when he’s not drunk, then he laughs way differently – more heart-warming and it feels special, because at home he giggles for Sicheng only.  
One of the girls pulls out her phone and hands it to Taeyong first, because she’s sitting closer to him. The boy watching has some kind of hope deep down, that Taeil won’t give his number to some stranger so soon and so easily, but he does. And it crushes something in Sicheng.

Taeil is going to be a great boyfriend, probably will find a sweet and smart girl that is younger than him. They are going to cook for each other, go out for walks at the park, go see the new movies as soon as they are released, play games together, sit and listen to the rain as Taeil plays his guitar, fall asleep at random places, just like Taeil does with Sicheng, but then the Chinese boy will be replaced. Their apartment is ideal for couples, Sicheng possibly will move out and find a place closer to his work and school, he could find a new flatmate too, if he will want it. They’ll definitely meet up at some friend-gatherings or club nights like this one, but they won’t take the same taxi to home, eat the same left-overs and fall asleep on their big sofa, with blankets and pillows all around, while soft music plays in the background and Taeils rests at Sichengs side.  
At this moment it hurts the boy so much. He can’t accept the fact, that he will have to move on from whatever their relationship is right now, because there are times when it seems like Taeil thinks of Sicheng more than just a best friend, but Sicheng knows that the elder is just clingy and likes to tease the other.

Yeah, Sicheng could just go up and tell how he feels about him, especially now, when he’s drunk, but he knows he will be rejected and even if Taeil will say that it’s okay, it won’t be the same and the moments that the younger likes to look back at will disappear even sooner.

That’s why Sicheng is sitting in this dumb club, at, like, 2 am, and not moving at all. His tired eyes are wet from the not-fallen tears and his nose got runny at some point. Kun is sleeping.

“Hey, you good?” Doyoung pops out of nowhere, alarming Sicheng about the rest of the people around him.  
He wants to go home, “I think I’m done for today.”  
“Okay, I’ll go call Taeil.”  
Sicheng recalls the agreement about going home together, but Taeil is having fun, “Nah, he can stay, he’s doing good. I’ll be okay.”  
“I already called a taxi for him,” Doyoung nods towards the knocked out Kun, who he is trying to lift from his seat, “should I get one for you too?”  
“That’d be nice.” Sicheng throws the last glance at bar before leaving, nobody’s there.

 

 

* * *

 

 

The ride home sucks. Everything inside Sicheng hurts, his chest is in pain and it feels empty. He’s sitting in the backseat, his head rested against the foggy window, some rain drops land on it and the city lights are blurry. The driver doesn’t talk to Sicheng and he’s glad, or else he would cry in a taxi and whine to an innocent stranger who is just doing his work at such early hours.  
But he has to do something with his emotions or he won’t make it till home with dry eyes. Sicheng pats around his pockets and pulls out his phone, unlocking it with the first try.

 

* * *

 

 

_Hi, yes, hey,_   
_Can I rant??,?_   
_Yes thankyou._   
_I’m like drunk, but not much, but like sad drunk, you know?_   
_And, like, why does life suck? why do we encounter problems we can’t open up about?? Dude, im so sad right now damn. how can you stop a thing that you aren’t sure has even started, or like forget stuff that you don’t want to forget?_   
_why can’t we read each others minds, it would be so much easier to almost everyone, can’t say stuff? Read the mind! Can’t tell what others are thinking? Read the mind!!;! want to know how they are feeling??  r e a d the m i n d_   
_I’d fucking die for chicken nuggets right now but I think if i’ll ask the driver to stop, he is going to leave me_   
_also it’s so pretty outsidem **[attachment available]** but like sad around this time. Don’t you get sad while staying up so late???? I should write u a normal answer,please remind me, we arrived, m going to sleep_   
_gn_   
_**2:46 am, ~Winwin**_

_**[attachment loading]**_  
  


**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i will try to come up with something short during the weekend, but what are the chances lol


	5. Chapter 5

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> if you havent noticed I dont really proofread, but I will, once I have bunch of time

Sicheng doesn’t quite remember how he got home and into his bed. He hasn’t taken his clothes off and they uncomfortably stick to his skin, making him feel filthy and hot. As soon as he’ll get out of the bed, he should take a shower, but it feels like it won’t be that soon, since he has gotten pretty hungover from last night.  
It feels like his throat has been replaced by desert and the ache reminds him about the strong drinks he consumed. His head feels too heavy to lift it from the soft pillows and he can’t pry his eyes open, because the sun is shining exactly on his face, as he lays in his favourite position.  The boy kind of still feels hungry from yesterday, but the chances that the food will make him more nauseous, cause the thought being pushed down.  
  
Sadly, his limbs start to go numb and he is forced to move from his current spot. Deciding to kill two bird with one stone, he unbuttons his jeans and starts to move his legs out of them, while unbuttoning his shirt, not worrying about ripping any buttons off. As soon as he gets out of the clothes, they are thrown somewhere on the floor. Since he had already moved from his position, the boy starts to try to roll on his other side, but apparently, he had slept way closer to the edge of the bed than he expected and almost falls out of it in the middle of the process. He quickly wakes up alarmed, as half of his back doesn’t feel a surface underneath it and is quick to shift back into his safe bed.

Sichengs lays on his back, debating whether to get up or not. His head is dizzy and he can feel how the blood is pumping simultaneously with his heartbeat. The boy sits up, looking for his phone, which is found on the floor, almost fully kicked under the bed. The battery is at 13%, surprisingly, Sicheng scrolls through the new notifications. There’s a new letter from Yuta, sent in the middle of the night, Sicheng will check it later, the light from the phone hurts his eyes now. He connects his phone to a charger and gazes out of the window for a while.

Right before the boys hand reaches to open his bedrooms door, he remembers about Taeil, that he, indeed, also lives here. The younger thinks about the fact that he’s still only in his boxers, but he hasn’t heard anybody wander around the apartment and there haven’t been any sounds from his friends room, so he assumes that Taeil is still deep in sleep. But just in a case the elder is up, Sicheng quickly makes his way to the bathroom, to get in the long-awaited shower. No one spots him and he safely arrives at his destination.  
He takes a look in the mirror, it kind of is the same Sicheng, only he now has dark circles under his eyes and the eyes themselves are red. His face looks kind of pale compared to his usual honey-skin. The boys hair is a complete mess and he can feel how dirty it is.

He showers with extra hot water this time, trying to get rid of the any feeling that is left from the previous night. It’s not like he has forgotten the fact that he got home alone and felt shitty. He doesn’t want to think about that. He doesn’t really want to see Taeil either. The thought of his presence makes Sichengs chest hurt. The younger understands that his friend had done nothing wrong and doesn’t know how differently he can effect the younger, and Sicheng shouldn’t just ignore him, but maybe it’s better to be more apart from each other now. Sicheng thinks of places he could go during the rest of the weekend, in order to spend less time at home.

He gets out of the shower and straight away dresses up in nice clothes, so he can leave the house as soon as possible. He debates with himself about at least having a coffee here, at home, to freshen up a bit, but he settles with a pill of pain relief, just in a case the sounds wake his friend up.  

As he slips into his sneakers and windbreaker, Sicheng notices the absence of Taeils shoes. He throws a glance at the second bedrooms door and it’s closed, Sicheng wonders at what state did his friend arrive home, to not being able to take his outdoor clothing off.

 

* * *

 

 

It’s sunny outside and noticeably warmer. Sicheng finds a small café somewhere in the city centre and orders a cup of black coffee and some pancakes with covered in honey.

 

* * *

 

 

_Yo…_  
_Dude if you wanna talk add me on snapchat - @yuyun, send me a letter when youre up._  
_**2:58 am, Yuta**_

__

* * *

 

 _Morning?_  
_I’m up…?_  
_Sorry, I got pretty somber and some stranger on the internet seemed like the best choice to whine to_  
_I’d say that Snapchat is one of the apps that give the least trust in getting to know somebody, I don’t send nudes lol_  
_Were you not sleeping again or I woke you up?_  
_**9:06 am, ~Winwin**_

* * *

****

****

Sicheng continues to slowly munch on his breakfast and play the cat game he recently downloaded on his phone. He’d rather have something salty now, he should get a big lunch later with bunch of meat, _oh my god,_ Sicheng would die for some pork right now.  
He’s busy tapping on the screen to feed an already fat cat, Yuta answers unexpectedly soon.

 

* * *

     

                                                          

 _good morning,_  
_well, it’s nice to know that you didn’t die_  
_yeah, I understand, no worries. We’ll definitely be at a point when I’ll rant about stuff 24/7 lol, just wait_  
_nah nah nah, I didn’t just expose my username for nudes. like, serious talk, I know that  life can really suck and that it’s not that easy to talk about it with people who you often meet, so, idk, you can talk to me…? and I like snapchat, because you can’t tell anything about the person, apart from their bitmoji and snap score. I understand if you simply don’t want to, we’re still kind of pretty unfamiliar lol_  
_actually, I was about to go to sleep and then u sent me that letter and I didn’t know – should I wait or u died somewhere, but I fell asleep like 15 minutes later anyway oops_  
_What are you doing?_  
_**9:14, Yuta**_

__

* * *

****

 

The boy doubtfully lingers his finger on top of the “+add” button. He puts his phone down and finishes his meal, puts back his jacket and adds Yuta to his friend list, immediately slipping his phone in the pocket.

He decides not to use his phone for as long as possible today. Sicheng loses a few hours wandering around a huge mall, not really buying anything, but at the same time everything looks so tempting. He gives in to buy a few new t-shirts, to _celebrate_ the end of the spring break – is what he uses as an excuse.  
People truly get happier once the real spring arrives, it so obvious to anyone, except themselves, but Sicheng can feel how better he appears, swinging the shopping bags in his hand and snacking on some chocolate bar. The boy orders a pretty big lunch for a one person, but the more food, the more time he spends somewhere else and not at home.

Slightly nervous, he pulls his phone out right before digging in his meal. Ignoring the notification from Snapchat, he decides to write a proper letter back, to cover up for the last nights one.

 

* * *

 

 

 _I’m just properly answering to the older letter lol_  
_I'm having a meal in the city rn, you?_  
_Debatable, I’d say that cats are better and way more cute. Catching the right moment, when the cat snuggles against you is way better, than a dog who does it most of the time. Also, cats, like, heal you and stuff, dogs just lick your face and then you’re left sticky, yuck_  
_No…I haven’t and probably won’t for a time, school starts and the first weeks will probably be hell and I don’t want a small kitten to go through that :,(But during the summer..hm… maybe I should get a step ahead and try to find a cat café to work in. have you ever been to one?_  
_You should start cooking home, it’s healthier and possibly also cheaper, I really need to send you the recipes, I promise I’ll send something during the rest of the weekend. Running sounds like an awful way to spend my time, but I could try!_  
_Well, sometimes I can’t wait until our guests would leave and it’s impolite to say that, but you’re already used to people around 24/7, you’re probably more out-going than me :p_  
_The key to going to sleep early is having an uninteresting life, so nothing could bother you. Dude, it feels so good to wake up easily, but then again, whenever I pull an all-nighter,  I’m pretty much dead the next day. How you will catch on sleep next week, huh?_  
_**1:47 pm, ~Winwin**_

__

* * *

 

 

Sicheng finishes his lunch and wanders around city for some more, at this part of the city there isn’t much more to do and if he doesn’t plan to arrive at home at late night, then his adventures for today are over.

Before heading home, the boy stops at a flower shop and gets a bunch of cornflowers to match his current bedsheets.

On the bus he listens to some old songs that make him feel nostalgic and Sicheng decides that he could work overtime to save up for tickets to China and back. He knows he can take at least a week of vacation, the idea makes him happier than he already is.

 

* * *

 

 

Sicheng slowly gets to his floor and he can feel as his palms become more sweaty as he’s looking for the key to their shared apartment. If Taeil sits at his usual place in the living room, the younger will excuse himself by telling that he’s going to video chat with his family, if his friend isn’t out of his room, he should give them a call anyway.

The boy opens the door and so far, the elder isn’t neither in the corridor nor in the living room. Sicheng takes off the outdoor clothes and by the absence of Taeils shoes yet again, the boy guesses that he still haven’t moved out of his room. That gives an opportunity to wander around the apartment freely. But, just in case, Sicheng checks the kitchen and slowly  opens the door to the bathroom, but still no sight of his friend.  
A thought of making him some coffee and food and bring it to him, to make Taeil feel better, kind of pops into the youngers mind, but quickly he realises that it’s against his previous decision.

Instead Sicheng quietly cleans up their place and makes some snacks for himself. It’s around 7 in the evening when he turns on his laptop and calls his mom through Skype. It’s the usual talk – how they have been, what they’re up to, how’s school, how’s family, what’s new. The boy brings up the theme of going home for some time, his mom offers to transfer him some money, to which he refuses, because he needs to deal it by himself. They go back to some funny stories from Sichengs childhood to brighten up the mood and it’s 9:05 pm when they end the call.

Sicheng decides to call it a day and changes into a new set of pyjamas. The cornflowers are placed on the windowsill, if he closes the curtains, the vase might fall down, so he leaves them open. There’s still a lot of light outside, the skies are in a pretty blue colour and the street lights give the city an almost movie-like vibe. People are still walking around and chatting, exchanging laughs. A loud bang from some houses doors is heard and the boy takes it as a signal that he should head to the bed.

He goes to the kitchen to refill his water bottle and make sure that all of the lights are turned off, so they won’t waste any electricity. The boy is drying his water bottle from the droplets that managed to pour outside the bottle, he hears someone outside their apartments door.  
At first he doesn’t pay much attention to it, but soon somebody is trying to get the door open. Sicheng looks for items that he could use to protect himself. He won’t go further into apartment than the kitchens doorway, so he peaks from it, but only a little bit, so the person couldn’t notice him straight away.

It’s been a solid minute, but the rustling hasn’t stopped and it’s freaking the boy out. He thinks about trying to rush to Taeils room, so he could have more chances of surviving. He could also pretend not to be here and attack the stranger, after that call the police. Or should he call the police now?  
He’s staring blankly at the door and when he hears the lock open, he’s panicking. Sicheng has never been in such a situation and the he can only come up with scenarios with bad ending.    

The moment is short and the apartments white door opens revealing chaotic looking Taeil. The younger deeply exhales and steps out of the kitchen. From one side, he feels extra relieved, but from the other – Taeil?

Sicheng was sure that Taeil had been in his room for the whole day, but here he is – standing in the hall, in the exactly same clothes that he wore on the Friday evening. His hair is messy from the hairspray he hasn’t washed out yet. The elder has dark circles under his eyes, just like Sicheng did earlier, but the smudged eyeliner brings them out even more. It looks like something had been spilled on his white shirt.  
The sad look in his eyes makes Sicheng feel something heavy on his chest and he wants to comfort the elder badly. But he doesn’t, instead they both stand, almost, on different ends of the apartment. Taeil looks at him sorrowfully, Sicheng looks back in surprise and confusion.

Taeil definitely didn’t come back last night, it makes the boy wonder _then where was he_ , but the younger doesn’t let himself think too deep about it. He probably slept at some friends place and had a hangover too bad to get home during the day.

There’s an unsettling silence that Taeil breaks, “I, uh, couldn’t find the right key.” He chuckles awkwardly, taking his shoes off.  
“Mhm...” Sicheng slowly drags as if such situations isn’t anything special. Taeil’s a grown up, he can do things however and whatever he wants. It doesn’t bother Sicheng, he thinks.  
“I’ll…” It seems like the elder can’t find words, but neither does Sicheng, “go, to sleep, I think.” He gives a weak smile in hopes to get out something more from the younger and forget about the tension in the room.  
“Yeah…” Sicheng starts to make his way to his bedroom, the uncomfortableness is starting to get on his nerves, “me too. Goodnight.” Not waiting for the answer, the boy is quick to disappear in his room and shutting the door behind him. Taeil is left alone, still standing in the hall, thinking if he really is going to sleep.

Sicheng doesn’t want to think about what just happened, it was strange, something was extremely off, but he can’t tell why they couldn’t hold a normal conversation. He quickly gets in the bed and drags his covers completely over his body and head. The boy shuts his eyes and thinks about going home, he can hear people outside talking, the door from Taeils bedroom stays silent. He’ll answer Yuta tomorrow.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I couldve easliy finished this on Monday, but my friend came over, and on Tuesday I had to catch up on procrastinated school works oof


	6. Chapter 6

**Yuta**  
**|** _is this the one and only ~Winwin ?_

**Sicheng _  
_ |** _not sure if the only one in the whole world, but definitely the one you promised to not to send nudes to_

Sicheng has woken up rather early for a Sunday, it’s little bit after 7 am. He considers going back to sleep, but since he didn’t close the window yesterday, all the morning light illuminates his already pastel room, making it hard to doze off again.

It’s too heated under the thick covers and the boy notes that he should find a way thinner blanket or a comforter somewhere. Sicheng finds his phone again from underneath the pillow and turns on some music quietly, so only he himself could hear it. The boy doesn’t really want to leave the bed and get on with his usual routine, because, firstly, it’s way too early and then the day will feel too long, and secondly, what if his friend is already up – the usual weekend pattern would be too awkward at the moment.

A soft ballad starts playing in the background, Sicheng sits up, still in the bed, and thinks about what to do on the last day of the break. Normally, he would go to some place with Taeil, spend the whole day outside their home, but now that is not an option. Sicheng could go to some shelter and take the animals for a walk, he could bring a bit of treats too, but he isn’t sure if they’re open today. _Oh!_ The recipes!  
The boy almost jumps out of the bed and rushes to one of the cabinet containing lots of books that haven’t been touched in ages. He pulls out two heavy cooking books.  Sicheng used to have a subscription to one of those telemarketing companies that won’t leave you alone until you agree to order something from them. At least it was something useful, not like cars or trees.  
He knows them by heart and it takes him seconds to find the eggs section, Sicheng takes photos of a couple recipes and looks more for some easy ones and takes shots of them too.

The boy gets back into his bed and turns on the music again. He curls into a ball under the warm covers and enjoys the last moments before fully starting his day.

Sudden ring from the phone scares Sicheng. The ringtone means that someone has sent him a message and it’s from Kun. It saves the rest of Sichengs day.

  
**_Kun_**

_Wanna hang out today? Like, all day?_

_It’s the last free day for you :p_

_If you’re free ofc_

* * *

 

Sicheng quietly takes a hot shower and leaves the home before Taeil, supposedly, hasn’t woken up, without having a breakfast. They decided to meet at Kuns place, which means that there is a pretty good chance of having a nice breakfast there, so the boy settles with a cup coffee that he gets at a food kiosk for now.

There are only a few people on the bus and the streets are too peaceful for a Sunday. Sicheng buys a small chocolate cake in a convenience store and his friends apartment is right around the corner. The boy easily makes his way to Kuns front door, they hang out relatively often. Kun is probably the second best person that Sicheng knows and trusts here _and_ he’s Chinese too.

Kun opens the entrance door and Sicheng is greeted by a warmly-coloured apartment. The soft, light brown carpet tingling his bare feet, Sicheng can clearly smell the fresh cinnamon buns his friend is quick to offer. They sit by the table in the kitchen, eating the warm buns and muffins, and think about places they could go today. Kuns girlfriend is visiting her parents, so nothing is stopping them from doing anything.

**Yuta**  
**|** _ah yes, the only thing that matters  
_ **|** _your real name is Sicheng, ~Winwin?_

* * *

 

_Dogs >cats. _  
_The wounds from cat scratches disappear after, like, a century or two.  Also, doggos protect your house and don’t get friendlier with strangers than with you, the owner themselve. But you should get a cat, still. You know that the pet resembles their owner? ;)_  
_I’ve never been to a cat café, you just spend bunch of money to play with cats and for food that you don’t pay attention to uuuhhhh no thanks. You could open your own cat café maybe? I’d go. But only when you’d get famous and I would show the screenshot of this letter, so people now whose idea it was._  
_Running sounds like it sucks, I agree, but idk, it’s more than an exercise. It’s good if you want to clear your head or blast music in your earphones. There’s no need to run long distances, like 2km also is good._  
_Cooking at the dorms*, once I go grocery shopping, I could. AnD oNcE yOu SeNd Me ThE rEcIpEs_  
_Guests come and go here, I guess that’s good. But the worst part is having no privacy, literally. There isn’t a moment that you are alone and it sucks more than you think, enjoy your separate room!!!_  
_I think I’ll actually try to go to sleep earlier, since the school starts again and stuff.  Or try at best. At least we’re not dropping out yet._  
_Going back to dorms today, can’t wait >:(_  
_**9:34 am, Yuta**_

****

* * *

****

 

They go to see a movie, it’s not really interesting and they both spend more time whispering dumb stuff to each other, rather than paying attention to the screen. After that they go to a park, where a new ice cream parlour had opened earlier this week. The sun is heating the air up quickly as the day goes on.

**Sicheng**  
**|** _ha, yes, I’m Sicheng  
_ **|** _you’re still a Yuta I see, how boring_

They wander around the park, exchanging admits about this being boring. Kun suggests going to a winery shop on the other side of the city, at first Sicheng  is sceptical, but he doesn’t mind sitting in a car and listening to songs he picks, since _it is not allowed to use phones while driving_.

**Yuta**  
| _you can call me a Japanese football legend too if u want_ ****  
| _:0 didn’t know you have a car_  
**|** _where are you going?_

They get some fast food on their way to replace the lunch. Kun picks a few red wine bottles and the younger considers it too, but he wants to stay away from alcohol for a while, but then again, it’s just wine. He ends up buying an overpriced bottle of white wine and they return to Kuns apartment. They pretty much don’t do anything. They sip on one of the wine bottles the elder opened, play some games and remember how to play the musical instruments Kun keeps in his home.

The elder offers to drive Sicheng back to his place, the younger debates whether it is a good idea, since Kun isn’t completely sober, but he doesn’t seem any drunk either, so he agrees.

**Sicheng**  
| _stalking much?_ ****  
| _came to visit a friend and he’s the one with a car, I’m stuck with busses_  
**|** _already at the dorms?_

Sicheng politely offers Kun to come up and meet Taeil, to what the elder refuses. His girlfriend probably should be home soon and the work days will probably keep them too busy to have some free time. They exchange goodbyes and Sicheng, with his wine bottle in hands, starts to get up to his own apartment. 

When he’s one floor away from his destination, he slows down. The clock on his phone screen shows 7:48 pm, if his flatmate is at home, then he should be up, school starts tomorrow, they should get ready.

**Yuta**  
| _yes, it’s whether I send nudes or I turn out to be stalker_ ****  
| _and you chose the second option_ ****  
| _yeah, I’m at hell and it’s already full of people_  
**|** _c a n you b e l i e v e , somebodys already drinking_

**Sicheng**  
**|** _ouch, it’s a lose-lose situation_  
**|** _no way you don’t drink, I don’t believe it_  
**|** _I may not live in the dorms, but I know that drinking is a part of life there  
_ **|** _oh,, I’ll send you the recipes before sleep_

 

* * *

 

 

Sicheng stands in front of the door. He tries to figure out if it’s locked or not. He knows that he properly shut it, but Taeil might have been somewhere. If he starts jiggling his keys, Taeil will definitely hear him, if he tries to open the door and it’s locked, then he’ll get caught too. The only good outcome can be if Sicheng tries to open door _and_ it turns out to be unlocked. He might try to sneak to his room, if Taeil is busy and doesn’t notice him.

The boys hand reaches the handle and carefully presses it down, so it won’t make any sounds. To his luck, when he starts pushing the door, it easily proceeds to open without making any noises. Sicheng quietly steps into his home, but when he lets the door out of his hand, he realises the mistake, as the door closes with a loud bang.

Sicheng looks around, wide eyed and panicked, he’s completely frozen, looking for any movements in the rooms in front of him. Taeil peeks from the kitchens doorway, just like the younger did the other night. They immediately make an eye contact and it’s no less awkward than last time. His friend is cooking beyond any doubt, the whole place smells like warm food, it means that they’ll probably share a dinner.  
Nothing comes in Sichengs mind to say and his mouth doesn’t work on its own this time.

“I was about to text you if you’re coming home,” Taeil breaks the silence, but the tension doesn’t go anywhere “…for dinner. I’m making dinner.” He wipes his hands in the kitchen towel, the younger still stays silent. “Spaghetti, are you joining?” Taeil still is looking at him hopefully.  
Sicheng starts to take off his shoes, “Yeah, smells good.” The younger sends a fake smile, but it seems to work for the other as Taeil smiles back. “Is it ready?”  
“Not yet, like 10 more minutes.”  
“I’ll go change then, I can set the table,” The boy starts to make his way to his room, “if you haven’t already.”  
The elder answers more enthusiastically, “No, I haven’t, it’s all yours.” Taeil flashes another grin before disappearing back in the kitchen.

Only when Sicheng gets into his room, he remembers about the bottle in his hands. There’s no way that his friend didn’t notice it, Sicheng curses at himself, he doesn’t want to _waste_ such an expensive wine for such a casual occasion, but it wouldn’t be a good manner to just act like he didn’t bring anything home. The boy changes into black sweatpants and the same colour hoodie, the right outfit for a wine night. He throws other clothes in the laundry basket and leaves his room feeling slightly anxious.

The food really smells good, the noises from the kitchen implies that Taeil still there. Sicheng steps into the room and the elder doesn’t pay any extra attention. He places the wine bottle on the countertop and opens the cupboard right in front of him, which contains various glasses in different shapes and colours.

“Want a glass?” Sicheng reaches his hand for two long stemmed glasses, before the other can even give an answer.  
“Wow,” Taeil drags, walking up to the younger and taking a better look at the bottle “white wine, fancy. Yeah.” Sicheng already has two glasses in front of him, he moves to find a bottle opener in one of the drawers, the other is left with the drink in his hands. The only sound in the room comes from the boiling pot.  
The boy quickly finds what he’s looking for and returns to his original place. Taeil places the bottle down and leans on against the countertop with his back, leaning on his arms at both of his sides. He keeps looking at Sicheng and his hands, working the bottle open, alternately, only making the task harder for the other.

“Give it to me,” Taeil turns around, Sicheng struggles for a second more before giving up and letting the bottle free. The elder quickly picks up the bottle and easily forces the sharp object into the cork. He pulls it out in seconds with a satisfying pop, the elder flashes a smirk to Sichengs way as in _that was quick, wasn’t it_.  
Taeil starts filling the glasses and the other finds distraction in setting the table. Sicheng places the white dinnerware set on the opposite sides of the table, the elder does the same with glasses and rushes back to bring the meal too. Sicheng takes his usual seat, his back facing the window.

He feels frustrated, this is just a dinner, with wine, which is the only odd thing about it. Taeil seems to be happy and he looks incomparably better than yesterday. His hair smells like his usual shampoo and the casual clothes on him look way better. And he cooked dinner, that’s a big step-up from their usual pizza meals on Sunday.  
Sicheng doesn’t fell as good though. There’s still something unsettling and it annoys him, he hopes he doesn’t seem moody to others. Maybe he’s making too big of a deal in his head about yesterday and it bothers him more than Taeil. Taeil doesn’t even know that it bothers his friend and probably won’t get to know either. Sicheng ruffles his hair and sneakily takes a sip from the glass. What else could they talk about during the dinner? It’s only the start of school or these two days that they haven’t talked or chatted.

Taeil returns with two big bowls, one of them containing pasta and the other is filled with sauce. Once he puts them down on the table, he doesn’t sit down, instead he goes to the kitchen again, leaving the other in interest. He’s quick to come back, with another dish, full of salad made of different greens and some utensils.

The elder sits on the opposite side, “Oh, come on! I’m not that bad of a cook.” Taeil probably noticed Sichengs stiff face expression. He motions his hands as if offering the younger to take the food first and he does. Taeil chuckles and continues to watch over the other, who packs his plate.  
“I hope so,” Sicheng answers plausibly, the food really looks tasty and he can feel his mouth get watery, “I don’t want to get sick right before school.”  
“Ah! Don’t mention that!” The elder whines, pretending to be in a pain, as he clutches his head.  
“Yeah, I know, I know.” Sicheng places the last bowl down and reaches for his glass, small amount of alcohol might make this evening to go faster, “Lets drink to that.” He lifts his hand, the grip on the glass strong, just in a case it slips.  
Taeil quickly starts to place the food in front of him, “Wait for me.” once he’s done, he turns his attention back to his friend, lifting his own glass, “Fuck school, lets drop out!” Taeil extends his hand even more, so their glasses could meet in the middle and Sicheng does the same.  
“Fuck school.” The younger agrees as their glasses clink, echoing throughout the whole silent apartment.

 

* * *

 

 

Taeil is all smiles and giggles the whole time, Sicheng tries to keep up, but he can feel that it doesn’t sound convincing enough, the other doesn’t mention it. Just as the younger predicted, they mostly talk about school, what should they pay more attention to and what lessons to skip. Taeil asks what Sicheng was up to today. He tells about the park and the winery, shocking the other, because _isn’t it too far?_ Then the boy answers that it was okay, he was with a friend who has a car, Taeil doesn’t ask which friend he was with, but Sicheng guesses he figured it on his own.

Though, Sicheng stays silent about the Saturday situation and Taeil doesn’t talk about it either, so the younger is left with nothing, but just trying to forget about it. They refill their glasses for a few times and Sicheng eats another plate of food, it tastes so appetizing.

Time truly goes by faster and Sicheng feels slightly light-headed, judging by his friends alcohol tolerance, Taeil should too. The empty bottle stands on the table, as Taeil keeps talking about how bad mainstream music is.  
It’s already dark outside and the only light comes from the kitchen and the lampposts from outside. Sicheng is resting his hand on the table and leaning his head into the palm of it. Taeil keeps on blabbering and not really knowing if the other is listening, but he is. Taeils voice is so appealing, it’s not like Sichengs own, deep voice. It’s a nice difference, the younger always had wondered why his friend didn’t pursue a singing career, he could play his guitar and write sweet love songs, _that might get mainstream_.

It’s been a while since Taeil had played the guitar _and_ sung, nowadays it’s just a quick 5 minutes of stroking the strings, playing pieces from the same songs. He says he doesn’t have the time, it’s sad to see such a talent get wasted, even if only his closer friends know about it.  
 Sicheng _loves_ when Taeil sings. They usually would sit at their usual place in the living room, the elder would have guitar in his lap, he would still lazy brush his fingers over the strings, quietly, but enough for both them to hear, his honeyed voice would reach Sichengs ears and, the soft words he would mutter, wouldn’t leave the youngers mind for days, because Taeil sings love songs. It would be just the two of them, Sicheng liked to imagine that he sings them for him.

Taeil seems to be moved to another topic, as he now is having a monologue about the best movie soundtracks, but the younger doesn’t mind. His friend is so deep into his speech and it only gives Sicheng the chance to slip into his dreamy state. Taeil looks so good today compared to the other day. The dim light falls nicely on his face, letting the shadows bring out his features. His smooth, rosy skin makes Sicheng wonder how would it feel against the hand of his palm, but the only sensation he’s met with is his own, hot cheek. He lifts his head from where it was resting, so the displeasing feeling would go away.  
He can’t find the fruity scent from Taeils shower gel, since they’re sitting so far from each other. Due to wine, it makes Sicheng sadder than it should.  
And it starts, the younger remembers that he decided not to let himself fantasize about his friend anymore, that he will be more distant from now on _and_ that he won’t drink anything for a while now. It kind of hurts in his chest, but he doesn’t let it take over him. Sicheng returns to listening to Taeils ideas and keeps his mind busy with that. Once he doesn’t let himself get the satisfaction of daydreaming, it’s get boring quickly.

It’s getting late too, Sicheng should excuse himself soon, promising to do the dishes tomorrow. The younger stretches his arms and legs under the table, waiting for Taeil to finish his sentence.  
However, he stops, once Sichengs phone beeps a few time in a row. The elder waits for Sicheng to do something. At first the boy didn’t plan to check what’s happening, but now his phone already is in his hands. When he finds out the reason for disturbance, the fact is met with a chuckle.

**Yuta**  
| _IS THAT WHERE YOUR NAME COMES FROM????_ ****  
| _LOSE – LOSE, WIN-WIN SITUATION = ~WINWIN_ ****  
| _CAN YOU BELIVE I COULDN’T FIGURE THAT OUT_ ****  
| _ALL THE YEARS OF EDUCATION AND IM STILL DUMB_ ****  
| _anyways, I do drink, but not often, I like to drink, but not too much, yknow_ ****  
| _what else then youre supposed to do with your free time in the dorms  
_**|** _definitely not spending it studying!!!!_

Sicheng takes the opportunity to start talking about how late it is and how they have to get up early again, he throws in that he’ll do the dishes tomorrow. Now it’s a monologue from the youngers side, he doesn’t really wait for Taeil to say anything, as he gets up and starts to collect the dirty dishes. The elder agrees with a nod and starts helping. They clean up the table rather quickly and in a silence. Sicheng throws out the empty bottle, he’s never paying for an expensive wine if it tastes just like the cheap one again.

He turns to Taeil to say goodnight, but his friend beats him to it, “Sicheng,” the elder pauses. It makes Sicheng stomach flip, the tone he spoke in is too serious for a “goodnight”, _so he will ask Sicheng to move out, huh_. But the younger doesn’t think about it much. “…goodnight.” The long silence means that it definitely wasn’t what Taeil intended to say, he smiles awkwardly and scratches his necks. He’s leaning on the countertop and waits for the answer.  
Sicheng sends a full smile back, “Goodnight, don’t stay up too late.”  
“I won’t.” And with that the younger makes his way to his room, leaving his friend in a silent apartment for the second day in the row.

**Sicheng**  
| _yeah, maybe you should drop out_ ****  
| _don’t forget to go to sleep early :p_  
**|** _im too lazy to write you the letter back rn, so take the recipes here:_

  
**|** _goodnight! :)_  


**Notes for the Chapter:**

> my litte cousins came over and, man, do i dislike children


	7. Chapter 7

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> !!!this chapter needs a lot of editing, sorry, will do it asap!!!!

Holiday ends and Sicheng gets into his updated everyday routine. Studies and work take up most of his time, he starts working extra on Thursdays and Fridays, he stays there until the café closes. He actually starts running in the mornings, skipping a few days here and there, Fridays being his _extra_ cheat days. It feels awful to put so much pressure on the muscles at such an early hours, but the icy showers after, which he now takes in a chilly bathroom, feel like the best type of refreshment.  
The studies aren’t going as good as he’d like to, but it doesn’t bother him much, as long as he’s not close to being kicked out rather than dropping out.

Sicheng keeps exchanging messages with Yuta.  They get more frequent due to boredom from both sides as they go about their day. Snapchat takes a lot of the boys phone battery, so he has to carry a charged power bank with himself everywhere. The option of playing games on there and random animals on the streets are the only thing keeping their streak alive, otherwise the app is used for chatting only.  
The letters are there too, it’s like having two completely different conversations at the same time. Yuta said that they have _a whole different vibe_ to them. It’s true, Sicheng agrees, the letters are more official and more thought-out, they contain a different way of expressing themselves.  
It’s fun and he keeps Sicheng busy.

Taeil hasn’t disappeared either. He’s still there - in their apartment, at his work that Sicheng passes on his way to his own workplace, shopping at the mall, sitting on the sofa, eating at their table, playing games, drinking tea.  
At first, Sicheng was _too busy_ , then he really got caught so much in his everyday activities, that the thoughts about his friends vanished from his head.  
They still interact – sometimes they eat together or play games when the younger doesn’t have _anything_ to do. Taeil also spends lesser time at home, same as Sicheng, work, university, friends.

There’s no doubt, they are getting more distant and, as the time goes on, the distance grows, but neither of them does anything about it, so Sicheng is left waiting for the moment when they’ll only exchange hellos and goodbyes to arrive.

Sicheng also spends more time with Kun. Turns out his life isn’t as sorted out as others might seem from outside, turns out that his girlfriend doesn’t want to get married anymore and it gets them in constant arguments. Sicheng tends to stay over at his friends place if Kuns girlfriend is away, which, nowadays, is pretty often.

The dance practices with Ten and Taeyong require more energy than usual. They are almost finished with a choreography for some song that Ten ended up finding. It doesn’t really have a purpose, but the passion about dancing keeps them going. For Sicheng it’s more about the performance now, rather than stress relieving, there’s jogging for that.

 _And_ Sicheng does drink less. The maximum is buying a cheap glass bottle of cocktail after a long day. Maybe he’s slowly getting his life together, maybe something awful is coming and it’s nice just for now. Either way, he’s committed to living in the moment.

 

* * *

 

 

After another long session of Wednesday dance practices, Kun comes to pick Sicheng up yet again. The end of May is approaching very fast, the weather rapidly gets warmer and more pleasant for late night walks from work to home. The procrastinated school work has piled up and the boy hasn’t got any wish do to something about it, he still has a few weeks, right?  
They stop at some fast food restaurant and get something to snack on at Kuns place before going to sleep. The city lights mixing with the dark sky and the sounds of car with a song quietly playing in the background, alongside with the fries they are eating right now make everything that’s happening feel so good.

**Yuta**  
| _chelsea won over leicester >:(_ ****  
**|** _are you still up?_ ****  
  
Sicheng  
| _yeah, I just finshed practice_ ****  
**|** _my friend picked me up again **  
**_ **|** _im listening to your rant  ;)_

Kun drops him off early in the morning, he packs the books he’s going to need today and is off to the lectures. Nowadays his breakfast consists of sour coffee and sandwiches that he buys at kiosks on his way to university. He goes through the usual Thrusday routine and is home almost at 11 pm, quickly changing his clothes and going to sleep. Fridays now are the same as Thursdays, instead of going somewhere for drinks, Sicheng arrives home late and rewards himself with sleeping in on Saturdays. In the weekends he tries to do as much homework as he can. On Sundays he cooks something nice and cleans everything up. Mondays are for grocery shopping and Tuesdays are simply hell, Sicheng would ask to change his shift somehow, but he needs money, so he just has to keep up, and it’s Wednesday again.

 **Yuta**  
| _mark my words:_ ****  
| _ill die in the middle of physics homework_

**Sicheng**  
| _try to learn German  
_ **|** _then we can talk_

**Yuta**  
| _i didn’t chose for you to learn it :p_ ****  
| _you must suffer_

Sicheng had to choose a new language to learn. He knows English on a good level, Korean too, others would chose Mandarin then, but he speaks it more than fluently. Maybe choosing Spanish was a better idea, but, oh well, now it’s too late. But the language isn’t most troubled subject right now, he’s definitely skipped way too many economic lectures and the half-done assignments have been laying on his desk for a while now. Sicheng might seem like the perfect student, who easily understands everything he is taught, but in reality, he would rather lay in his soft bed, than try not to fall asleep as the professor keeps on talking. Sometimes it’s hard to believe that Sicheng actually pays for this.

Two more weeks and he will be free from all the studies and none of this piled up work won’t matter. It’s funny how all this stuff puts students in so much stress and when it’s done it means almost nothing. Technically, your grades don’t matter as long as you pass. Sicheng doesn’t really have any plans for summer, aside from going home for some time and taking some time away from the work. He will probably go on trips and some journeys with his friends or maybe he could try traveling alone.  
Sicheng should doubtlessly meet up with his sister somehow, it has been way too long since he had seen her. If he puts in extra effort, then the siblings could make a nice surprise to their parents and travel somewhere together as a family. That would be very nice.

Also, he is going to catch up on all the sleep he has managed to lose due to schoolwork and generally work.

Yet again Sicheng arrives to their silent apartment slightly after 11 pm. The floor lamp in the living room is left turned on, so the boy could navigate around the dark space. It’s Friday, so Taeil probably is out somewhere celebrating the end of workdays just like they used to.

 **Yuta**  
| _economics aren’t THAT bad_ ****  
| _may I say,_  
**|** _theyre decent_ ****  
| _and interesting sometimes_

He carelessly wanders around the empty rooms and prepares for a well-deserved sleep. The boy snacks on some chips, he turns the TV on, maybe there’s a good movie somewhere. Sicheng switches between channels, finding a few new reports, sports games and horror movies, nothing good, sleep it is then.  
He goes to the bathroom to brush his teeth. The last time he spent a good time of examining his features was when he was hungover, so the image of him looking bad had still remained deep in his memory. He has time, so he tries to look at himself as if he would be seeing his own face for the first time. The dark circles are definitely gone and his eyes don’t look gloomy, they reflect the light from the built-in ceiling light bulbs and, in the brown orbs, there is a visible sparkle of the white light. His eyes seem bigger overall, just as big and round as his pinkish cheeks. The blush on the sun-kissed skin looks so natural, that no one can tell when he’s actually blushing, Sicheng likes that. The cupid bow from his pointy nose leads to his full, deeply-pink lips. He smiles at what he sees and his pearl-whites show up. The combination of his barely visible dimples, with his playful lips and the white teeth looks so damn good in the mirror, _maybe he should have gone out today.  
_Sicheng ruffles his hair a bit, creating a middle part, like he would do if he was going somewhere today. He likes, no, he _loves_ the way he looks, it’s a huge step up from the last time.

 **Sicheng**  
| _im not reading all that_ ****  
| _volleyball still is better than football_ ****  
| _your argument is invalid_ ****  
| _shouldn’t you be sleeping? healthy sleep schedule????_

**Yuta**

**|** _oh, screw you_  
**|** _a man with no taste_ ****  
| _maybe, but you said some absurd stuff and I had to step in_ ****  
| _youre the one to blame for my bad sleeping habits_

 **Sicheng**  
| _ill remember these words_ ****  
| _as you wish, mr.healthy life style_ ****  
| _goodnight :p_

 

* * *

 

 

Another week goes by, which leads Sicheng and most of his friends to the last week of university. They meet up way less and Sicheng event turns down Kuns offers of going to some new movies, because he needs to finish his late projects and get ready for exams. What a bunch of responsible adults they are at the last week of school.

It’s May 25th, Saturday, 10:03 pm and Sicheng hates himself for skipping the economy lectures again. The words in his textbook doesn’t leave a trace in his mind, as if everything that he had read in the past hour hasn’t even been in the book. Yuta keeps on texting him, which is one of the distractions, other being Taeil watching something on the TV. Who could’ve thought that the one who wouldn’t be able to keep up with school is going to be Sicheng, not his friend who spends most of the time sleeping in class. At least the younger tries to stay awake, but Taeil says that he has completely given up and goes there just for the attendance.

He flips through some random pages in hopes to find some diagrams, that maybe will help him to get something in his head, but no success. It just one week of complete stress, _he can get through this._ Sicheng closes the book and throws another look at his notes. Nothing makes sense at this _late_ hour, maybe he should just go to sleep. He can go to sleep, he has a full day tomorrow too, but something inside of him bothers the boy so much, that he just has to learn something from this sitting. Sicheng throws his head back and closes his eyes, he listens to the TV from the other room, his phone beeps again.

**Yuta**  
| _stop whining and go to sleep_ ****  
| _you can read tomorrow too, you know?  
_ **|** _don’t overwork yourself?_

**Sicheng**  
| _Have you ever had the need to accomplish something????_ ****  
| _its inside me rn and it irritates the fuck out of me_

**Yuta  
|** _youre at home?_

Sicheng decides for a rather spontaneous step and takes his book and the notebooks with him, as he leaves his bedrooms desk to head to the living room. As soon as he steps out of his room, he meets his eyes with Taeil sitting at his usual spot on the sofa, with a cup of tea and a piece of cake in front of him, he has a blanked wrapped around him and all the pillows are placed around him.

Sicheng talks in his usual tone, like he has been doing with his friend, he knows that things are different, but pretends not to know, “Hey, are you busy?” The boy motions to the TV.  
“No, not really. What’s up?” Taeil has been doing the same thing as Sicheng, that is, pretending that this is how they have always been. “Schoolwork?”  
Sichengs glad that his friend picked up on it so easily, “Yeah, economy. You used to learn it, right?” The boy makes his way to the furniture and takes a seat beside his friend, placing the books in the middle of them. ****  
“Yeah, and then I dropped it,” Taeil chuckles, changing his position, so he could face the other more, “need help?”  
The younger crosses his legs in front of him, meaning that he plans to stay here for a while, “If you don’t mind?”  
Taeil turns down the volume for TV and takes a sip from his cup, “Nah, the subject is quite boring, but I believe I remember most of what I learned.”

Sicheng starts to flip through the textbooks pages, trying to find the right section again, meanwhile the other has the notebook in his hands. It’s a short amount of an awkward silence, but once Taeil gets till Sichengs last taken notes, he starts to explain that the theme isn’t that hard, that you just have to understand the way different parts connect and it’s easier from there. The younger feels some kind of relief, maybe he just was trying to learn it the wrong way.  
Taeil hands Sicheng back his notebook and rests against the soft surface, he starts with mentioning some of the economy basics, that the other understands easily, when some time has passed and the elder gets to the point about what Sicheng apparently had read in the book, the younger opens a blank page in his notebook and starts to take actual notes. After a while the blue mess on the white pages start to come together and it _clicks_ , it feels like a heavy weight has been lifted from Sichengs shoulders, because _he gets it now_. It seems way easier when someone uses _real_ words to explain things, rather than the _scientific ones_.

Sicheng doesn’t know how much time had passed, but there’s a different movie on now. Taeil has ended his monologue and waits for Sicheng to ask questions, but all he can say is _it seems so easy now, this goes there and that there, I get it!_ It makes Taeil feel nice, he’s tired, it’s past his nowadays bedtime, but if he had a chance to spend time with Sicheng again, then it’s more than worth it.  

They both sit in a silence, listening to what the people in the movie is talking about, for Sicheng it seems like some kind of thriller. He debates about staying here and watching the TV, when the phone in the pocket of his shorts rings again.

**Yuta  
|** _fell asleep?_

**Sicheng**  
| _no,_ ****  
| _yeah, im home, why?  
_ **|** _so, you are a kidnapper huh_

Taeil finishes his piece of cake, placing the empty plate on the coffee table. Sicheng wouldn’t mind a piece right now. “Do you want some cake?” The elder asks, if reading the others mind. Sicheng doesn’t give an answer immediately, thinking if eating sweets at such late hour is worth it. “Strawberry cake. I’m getting myself another piece, so think quickly.”

The elder starts to roll out of the blanket and takes the empty dish in his hand again. He stands up and Sicheng thinks through this quickly – he actually has learned something today, there’s a decent movie on the TV and he could get a piece of strawberry cake, maybe even some tea, he could curl up under a blanket too. It sounds way too good. Taeil is still standing and waiting for an answer.

Sicheng looks at his friend and smiles, at first, without saying anything, Taeil smiles back, “I…” just as the younger was about to accept the tempting offer, his phone starts to ring yet again, but this time  it’s continuous, meaning that someone is calling him at this late hour.  
The smile from Taeils face is quick to fade and Sichengs expression is replaced with pure surprise, as his phone screen shows that it’s 11:27 pm and Yuta is calling him.

“I’m sorry, next time.” Sicheng finally answers Taeil and starts to quickly pick his books and stands up, ready to rush to his room, he sends a weak smile to his friend, “Goodnight.”  
Taeil answers with a sigh and starts to make his way to the kitchen at the same time with Sicheng, who goes back to his bedroom instead, “Goodnight.”

 

* * *

 

 

It has been solid 20 seconds and the phones screen hasn’t changed, still showing the incoming call. Sicheng is almost scared, he’s biting into his fingers and his heartbeat is ringing in his ears. Yuta knows how Sicheng looks, but Sicheng knows exactly nothing about Yuta. He feels sleepy, but way too nervous at the same time. What does this stranger wants from him? What if he isn't what Sicheng has been imagining?

11:28 pm, Sicheng picks up.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i had a shitty week, so this chapter is kind of late and overall not as good as id like it to be  
> also, if you didnt pick it up - i wont be writing each one of the chats and letters between yuwin


	8. Chapter 8

Sicheng is sitting in the middle of his bed, his legs are crossed in front of him. The apartment is dead silent, except for the phone in his right hand ringing. The room is poorly lit, the small amount of light is coming from his bedside lamp. It’s late, he could not pick up and pretend that he had fallen asleep right after sending the last message. Sicheng hasn’t noticed that he’s been biting his nails, until he does it too harsh and slightly hurts himself.

His thumb moves over the screen. Something in him really wants to answer and see if Yuta really is _Yuta_. However, the other part of him doesn’t want to ruin the image of Yuta he has come up in his mind during the time. _Yuta_ could be anyone, all Sicheng knows that he might be 24 years old and he apparently has a well-built body, since he’s Japanese, he should have extra dark hair and brown eyes, also he once said that _he thinks he_ is handsome. Adding all this up, he has made up a pretty nice character for his _friend_.  
As Taeil closes his rooms door with a bang that echoes throughout their shared place, Sicheng picks up the video call.

In the few seconds the call takes to connect, Sicheng makes sure that he has the back camera mode on, so he wouldn’t be the first thing that the other sees. The connecting takes longer than the boy expects, so he moves around his bed, so that his back would be resting against the beds wooden headboard. He stretches out his legs to seem more relaxed. It still hasn’t connected, most of the screen is black, with a loading icon on it, on the top right corner there’s the frame that Yuta is supposed to see – from the angle that Sicheng is holding his phone- his legs, part of the bed, the desk and the chair in front of it are visible.

The longer it takes for the view from the other side show up, the more Sicheng gets nervous. Maybe he should quickly cancel this and blame it on his poor internet connection, maybe he doesn’t want to know who is going to be on the other end, maybe being online friends or _penpals_ is dumb, because what’s the point if you won’t have an actual , real-life connection with them? Yeah, you can always be there for each other through texts and calls, but it can’t be compared to real human contact.  
There’s no need to take it further than chatting.  
Sicheng cancels the call, the phone screen shows his homescreen again, until the boy locks it.

He will text Yuta tomorrow, but now he’s going to sleep. Sicheng throws his phone somewhere in the bed as he gets up. He takes off his shirt while walking towards his wardrobe to get his sleepwear, which he easily finds. He tosses the shirt on the chair and changes into his pyjama one, he starts to untie his sweatpants and his phone starts to buzz again.

The boy picks it up from the blue covers, it’s Kun. Strange, shouldn’t he be sleeping? Sicheng suspiciously picks it up, “Hello?”  
“Yeah, hey, important question?” Judging by the tone of Kuns voice, he’s pretty serious about whatever he’s about to say.  
Sicheng stays silent for a second, thinking that his friend will continue, but he doesn’t, “I’m listening.”  
“Have you borrowed my charger?” Kun asks pretty desperately.  
“Uh, no… Do you mean the phone one or computer? Or others?”  
The elder on the other ends whines, “I mean the phone one,” Kun exhales deeply, “Fuck, I have lost it and, you know, I can’t live without it.”  
Sicheng chuckles, “Well, sucks to be you.”  
“Yeah, yeah. Sorry for bothering you so late.” Kun sheepishly answers.  
“Nah, it’s okay. Was that it?”  
The elder hums, “Yeah, go back to sleep. See you soon, goodnight.”  
“Yeah, goodnight.” Sicheng hangs up first and throws his phone back, proceeding to change into his pyjamas.

Once he’s done, Sicheng goes to the bathroom to brush his teeth and end this day as soon as possible. In the middle of the process, he realizes that he _might_ have taken Kuns charger days ago, as he accidentally took one of his friends hoodies instead of his own. He rushes to his room with the toothbrush in his mouth, he is already thinking where he put it, he thinks he might have put it back in the bag and the bag under the desk.

Sicheng enters his room, not minding to close the door properly, but instead of going for his bag, he grunts and looks for his phone, which is buzzing in his bed again. He’s quite annoyed, the boy could be having a peaceful sleep by now, but instead he has been kept up with useless phone calls and dumb homework. Sicheng mindlessly slides his finger over the screen and answers the phone.

It hits him like a rock that it’s Yuta again. He remembers about his state right now, in his pyjamas and toothbrush in the mouth, as he glimpses at the top right corner. It’s the darned front camera, that the boy didn’t bother to check. He understands that Yuta can see him now, it would be strange to flip the camera or turn it so it would show something useless, so instead Sicheng just tilts the phone a bit, so his face is visible from the middle of the nose and up.  It’s just half of his face and a white ceiling, the rest of the screen where _Yuta_ should have been displayed is completely black.  
It scares Sicheng.

The first thought that comes up in his mind is that _Yuta_ actually is one of those creepy old men who are just looking for their preys on the penpal page and Sicheng has fallen in their trap.

Both of the ends stay silent, probably because Sicheng doesn’t know why Yuta wants to call him, so he has no clue how to start the conversation, _and_ because Yuta doesn’t want to expose his old mans voice. Maybe even chats are too much, Sicheng debates ending the call again and stopping all the texts on any platforms, maybe he’s just too dramatic.

The screen is still black, he thinks that it might have frozen, since none of them have moved, but after a second, he can see shifting on the other side, even though it’s still stays pretty dark.

What the boy doesn’t except is the dark block on his phone to get quickly lighter and expose a brunet, judging by the hair and the eyebrows, with dark brown eyes. That’s all that Sicheng is able to see. He’s quick to realise that the person on the other end had copied his own position – not to expose too much of the face, but enough to understand that it _is_ the right person that you’re talking to. Sicheng knows that his eyes widened, but he acts like it’s nothing. He can feel his heart speeding up and the hand that’s holding the phone get sweatier.

“Winwin?” Yuta breaks the awkward silence between them. It leaves a strange feeling in Sicheng, he was sure that his voice would be deeper.  
The boy debates between confirming that he, indeed, is _~Winwin_ or give a question back. “Winwin, yeah. I’m Winwin.” Sicheng stutters, words seem hard to pronounce with full mouth. He feels like he had just woken up and a new wave of energy comes over him, but it doesn’t seem to come in handy, as he doesn’t know how to continue this.  
“You good?” Sicheng guesses that Yuta is talking about his pronunciation, “You must be busy, not picking up.” The brunet furrows his eyebrows. Sicheng can’t answer unless he gets rid of the toothbrush, _fuck_.  
The boy blurts out a, hopefully, understandable “Hold up!” He throws the phone back on the bed again and rushes to the bathroom to finish his earlier intentions. It takes seconds and the boy sprints to his room, this time shutting the door behind him.  
Sicheng jumps into his bed, there’s a strange excitement growing inside him, “I’m back.”  
Yuta is still in the same position, when the other picks up his phone and positions it in the same way as before, Sicheng believes that the other was left in a confusion, “I was in the middle of brushing my teeth, sorry.”  The boy explains.  
“ Oh.” Yuta drags. They have been texting for over two months, but it feels like they’re getting to know each other for the first time and it makes this conversation awkward. “Yeah, it’s late. If you were planning to go to sleep, then I can call you any other time.”  
“No, no!” Sicheng is quick to answer, “It’s okay. I wasn’t planning to sleep yet.” The boy lies, he wants to know how this is going to end.  
“Oho, so where did your healthy sleep schedule go?” The other asks with a mocking tone, ending his question with a chuckle.  
Sicheng decides to play along, “Where did the guy who goes to gym everyday go? He hasn’t been seen there for a week?” He debates whether he didn’t take it _too far_ and won’t come out as a rude person. He relaxes when Yuta laughs and doesn’t take his answer to heart, Sicheng chuckles along.  
Yuta ruffles his brown locks, “Okay, ouch, we’re even now.” Silence settles again, it’s less tense this time.  
Sicheng’s still curious about the others intentions, “Do you have any motive or …?”  
With more energy Yuta answers, “I, uh, actually thought I could help you… with economics, since I find them easy and you… not really, and… And I think it’s easier to explain stuff actually talking, instead of texting.”  
He seems to have obvious reasons, the only problem is that, that Taeil pretty much already explained everything, but Yuta doesn’t know that. “Yeah, I understand. But wouldn’t that be too nice from a stranger?”  
“Well, if you still consider me a stranger, you could’ve just not picked up.”  Yuta makes a clicking sound.  
“Ok, you got me there.”  Sicheng chuckles again, “So…”  
“So… do you need help or nah?” Yuta re-asks the question, straight-forward this time.  
Sicheng doesn’t hesitate to give an answer, “Yeah, I do. If you don’t mind that it’s late already.”  
“Nah, so what exactly you need help with?”

Sicheng tells about the themes that the upcoming exam should contain, as Yuta starts to flip the pages of his notebook and explain the easier stuff first. The brunet repositions his phone, leaning it against somewhere, so now his head and torso is visible to the other. Sicheng can’t deny that he is, indeed, handsome. His face has sharp creatures, his hair is actually messy, his shoulders are board and make him look pretty buff. Sicheng readjusts his position too, not as much as the other though, he moves his hand, so the phone wouldn’t be so close to his face. The top right corner now shows Sicheng from his chest and up.

They start to have actual conversations with no pressure. At first they do talk about economics, but then the themes wander about random stuff. The time goes by fast, Sichengs sleep disappeared for a while, but now that it’s approaching 2 am, it’s kind of coming back. Yuta probably noticed that Sicheng keeps on yawning time to time and suggests that they end the call for today, reassuring that they can talk any other time they’re both free. The boy agrees and exchange final goodbyes with the brunet. Once the picture of Yuta disappears, Sicheng is left with a fuzzy feeling inside him, he’s pleasantly tired and happy to finally drift to sleep. However, when he makes himself comfortable under the heavy covers, he can’t stop thinking about the video call, Sicheng ends up staying awake for at least another half an hour.

 

* * *

 

 

 _Goodmorning,_  
_I’m getting old, I cant go to sleep late anymore, I woke up after 1 pm_  
_I believe I won’t ever make over my room again, it costs way too much money and mine’ s in pretty good colours, so I could live in it comfortably even when im 70 years old lol_  
_Idk I usually wear light jeans or shorts at a VERY hot day and a t-shirt. Don’t you feel uncomfortable in tank tops??? I feel like they expose me too much D:_  
_Also, send me more anime recommendations, I gonna finish this one sooner than I thought lol How are you and my TV show going?_  
_I’ll probably go to the zoo later, I believe that most of the animals aren’t let out of their winter abiding place yet_  
_Thanks for economics again…_  
_Nice profile picture btw_  
_**2:07 pm, ~Winwin**_

* * *

 

Sicheng doesn’t do much on Sunday, he spends almost the whole day in his bed listening to music and snacking on stuff, the worries about upcoming exams have disappeared somewhere and the boy doesn’t bother to think about them.

The next week starts, meaning that the summer is almost here and that Sicheng only has to get through five more days. He has saved up enough money for plane tickets to get to China and back, but he’s going to keep on working, to have some money to spend mindlessly.  
On Wednesday Kun picks the boy from practice and, this time, they head to Sichengs place, since his friend _hasn’t seen Taeil in a long time_. Sicheng thinks that it’s strange, he expected to Kun and Taeil hang out together each time Taeil had gone out. After all, Sicheng was the _new friend_ \- Taeil had introduced him to Kun.

It’s late when they arrive at the destination, on the way home, both decided to get some frozen pizzas for dinner. Kun walks in front of the other and bursts through the entrance door without any warning, scaring Taeil, who is sitting in the usual spot, watching TV.

Sicheng offers to take care of pizzas and leaves the talking to the other two males, which seems to flow ease. When he returns with food and a bottle of soda, the boy is met with a statement that he has to free his next Saturday, to go for a lunch with his two _bestfriends_. It has been a while since Sicheng has called Taeil his bestfriend and he’s not sure if he thinks of Kun like that, but he lets it slide and says that everything should be okay.

They sit like that for a while; Taeil, Kun and Sicheng; talking about nonsense, until the eldest starts to complain about the sleep he’s missing right now. They offer for Kun to stay over, which he accepts. Sicheng looks for some of his clothes, that would fit his friend, since Taeil ones would be too small. When he comes out of his room, Taeil had already given Kun the pillows and a blanket. Kun thanks Sicheng for the clothes and gives a goodnight to both of them.  
Sicheng and Taeil reply with goodnights to Kun and are off to their rooms, leaving their friend to rest on the sofa.

 

* * *

 

 

The Friday comes around fast. The exams are over and some of the results are already back. They aren’t as good as Sicheng would like, but they’re not bad either, he can do better next year.

The boy comes back from his late work hours, surprisingly, to not an empty home. He finds his friend, which seems like, in a nervous state. Taeil is sitting by the table they used to eat, with his phone in his hand and a glass of water in front of him. Sicheng asks if he is okay, to what the other just smiles back. The boy thinks about trying to get out the actual reason, but leaves it at that. It doesn’t affect him, so by his not so new standards, he doesn’t ask about it and continues with his usual evening routine.

He had already used to being alone in the apartment on Fridays. The other person being here kind of doesn’t let him relax fully _and_ the person doesn’t seem to be happy, just adding weight to the boys shoulders.  
Once Sicheng is done with everything  and is ready to go to sleep, he heads to his bedroom. Right before he opens the door and steps into the isolated place, the boy shouts a _goodnight_ to his friend. Unlike all the other times, Sicheng has to wait for an answer that doesn’t come. He silently closes the door behind him.

When he turns off all the lights and closes the curtains, Sicheng is left in a completely black room. He gets under the covers in his bed.  
After a while they get way too hot and it feels like they’re trying to suffocate him. The blanket feels too heavy on his body and the pillows hug his head in too deep. His chest feels heavy and his head hurts a bit.  
Sicheng throws the blanket off and wants to spread his limbs all across the bed, but his body only curls up into a tighter ball. Centimetres more and his knees would reach his chest. It starts to burn from the inside, there’s no air in the room and he can’t move. His body is covered in cold sweat, that balances out the torrid feeling, leaving Sicheng emotionally blank for a moment, which he uses to gather all his strength and get up.

The boy stumbles a few times until he reaches the window. He gets behind the curtains and troubles to get the window open, but succeeds. The chilly air hits his face, making his skin feel colder across the cheeks. Sicheng lifts his hands to cup the cheeks and warm them up, his palms are met with a wet surface. _Of course,_ tears.

Sicheng stands like that for a moment, with his slightly wet hands in front of him, gazing into the peaceful city in front of him.

 _He_ even didn’t wish a _fucking goodnight_ back. So, look how far it has come, huh. But wasn’t that exactly what you expected, what you _wanted?  
_Didn’t they laugh together when Kun was here? Yeah, they did, but it either was fake or meant for Kun. Not for him, it was never for him, _he_ always has fun with everyone he meets, he just used to be selfish and wanted it all to him. And now, when he gets nothing, the space in him, meant for them two, leaves an empty feeling.  
The fact that _he_ has nothing to do with this and he did it all to himself, only adds to the weight in chest. Maybe the false hope was better than having no hope at all, but you can’t turn back the time. The damage that he has managed to make isn’t easy to repair and he doesn’t have any strength to do it.

Why is it always night when you get sad?  
Oh, right! Because this used to be the exact time that you spent wondering how it would feel to lay in _his_ arms. How _his_ palm would feel against your hair as _he_ would pet your hair until you would fall asleep, how _he_ would keep you warm during the cold and lonely nights, how _he_ would wake you up with morning kisses and you both would sit next to each other at the breakfast table. How _he_ would kiss you when _he_ leaves and when _he_ comes back, how _his_ warm body would feel against yours in late nights, skin to skin, lips meeting lips, how delicate _he_ would be with you.

Sicheng brushes the back of his hand over his lips to get rid of the salvia that has collected on them from constantly biting into them.

_Fuck you, Sicheng._

_Fuck you,_ because you couldn’t set for a simple friendship, you were selfish and wanted more. Now neither of you are happy and it’s all your fault. Taeil actually lives from the human contact, not like you, who can lock himself in his room and deal with everything by yourself, if this you call this _dealing_.  
You’re hurting him, Sicheng. You see _him_ sad, sorrowful, nervous, lonely, but you don’t bother asking about it. _He_ doesn’t ask you about it, because you keep acting as if everything is as it should be. When was the last time you saw _him_ truly happy? Definitely not when you have been around. Maybe you _should_ move out. Forget about the tickets to China and invest the money in a new flat, because running away is easier, right? Coming here from abroad wasn’t that hard for you, huh?  

Sichengs phone buzzes from his nightstand, throwing him off from his thought trail. The boy moves away from the window, leaving it open.

 **Yuta  
|** _:)_  
**|** _I failed my physics exam_   

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> happy easter?


	9. Chapter 9

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I would really appriciate if you would read the notes under this chapter!

The sleep after crying feels different, the headache along with the dry nose and throat are more noticeable than any other times Sicheng had woken up. The curtains, he didn’t bother closing at night, let the sun rays reach his bed, making it hard for the boy to drift to sleep again. He covers his head with the blue covers, but it’s too hot underneath them, making it hard to breathe, so he just has to lay on the bed with his head out and let the light be.

Sicheng doesn’t want to go anywhere today, he could lie and text both of his friends that he feels slightly sick, which probably would be believable enough, as the boy supposes that he doesn’t look exactly excellent after the stuff that happened before he fell asleep. Maybe he could keep on pretending that he is sleeping and wake up _so_ late that all he could do is apologize a hundred times and promise to make it next time. He’s going to settle with one of the options, depending on how the situation will progress, but for now, the boy presses his duvet closer to him and exhales a deep breath in order to relax.

He is laying in the same position maybe for 5 minutes or 20, he hasn’t bothered to check the clock this morning. He would have stayed like that, not disturbed, if not for the soft knocks on his bedrooms door.  
It’s not Taeil. Taeil never knocks before entering Sichengs room, he would just open the door quietly and slowly at the best scenario. However, his other friends would at least make a notice before entering the boys private space.  So, he waits, too lazy to get up and give up on falling asleep. A moment passes, but nobody opens the door. The boy keeps on resting on his bed, getting curious of who could it be. As far as Sicheng knows, nobody told him that they would be coming over, but it might as well be some of his flatmates friends.  
Two, what seems, hesitant knocks land on the other side of the white doors again. Sicheng waits for a second.

“Yes?” The boy calls out, since it seems like the person on the other side won’t enter by themselves. His voice sounds raspy from the ache in his throat. Even after the call, the door seem to open unwillingly.

“Oh,” it’s Taeil after all, _oh,_ “I hope I didn’t wake you up. I wanted to ask if you’re still coming?” He hasn’t properly entered the room, only his upper half is visible from the narrow opening. It makes the younger to wonder when was the last time they were hanging out in ones or another’s room.

Sicheng finally glances at the clock on the wall. Almost 11:45 am. The bus at their stop arrives at 12:24 am, the lunch is at 1 pm. That’s a bit too little time for getting ready than the boy would like to.  
“Yeah, yeah. I am. I was just about to get up.” Sicheng throws off the blanket as he sits up and positions himself on the edge of the bed.

“Okay.” Taeil nods his head and with that leaves, closing the door behind him.  


* * *

 

 

They still sat next to each other at the back of the bus, where they would usually exchange news or laugh about their day or stupid memories, while annoying other tired people around them. Sicheng wouldn’t say that today the ride is uncomfortable, they have more small talk than probably they have had this whole week. They haven’t hanged out almost not at all lately and their private life have gotten _really private_ , so there isn’t even much to talk about.

The stop they get off and the café they decided to meet are separated by a 10 minute walk. The weather is extremely nice. The heat is at the peak of the day, if you want, then you can sense a slight breeze of wind, but it’s no use for cooling down, since it’s warm too. People are taking over the streets, dressing thinner and thinner. Sicheng slightly regrets throwing on a pair of black jeans and a pretty tight t-shirt, he bets that Taeil feels way better, wearing khaki coloured shorts alongside a palm printed button up with short sleeves. He has managed to keep pretty buff and tanned throughout the winter, Sichengs jogging seems to be only improving his stamina, not his muscles.

 They arrive a few minutes before rearranged time, Kun seems to be not here yet, so they take a four seat table close to one of the air conditioners. Sicheng immediately offers to order something to drink while waiting for their friend, he knows that there isn’t much topics left to talk about, so he rather sits and drinks, in hopes to make it less uncomfortable. Taeil suggests to order some ice cream smoothies, getting himself a berry one, while the other rather chooses banana flavour.

Once the drinks arrive, Kun is 10 minutes late. Both of them decide to keep on waiting, since god knows where he is, their main guess being that he’s stuck in traffic with bunch of other drivers.

The conversation starts to fall and Taeil’s already finished half of his refreshment. Sicheng takes it slower, but as more and more time passes, the hunger starts to really settle in, since he slept through the usual breakfast time. To distract himself, he reaches for the phone in his bag. He notes not to use it much, because his friend isn’t using his own, so that would be impolite.

**Yuta**  
| _I am so fucked_ ****  
**|** _I have no fucking clue what to do_  
**|** _Yeah, Ill try to sleep too, please text me when youre up, I need to keep complaining_  
**|** _morning hope youre doing better than ME because guess who just got invited to have a talk with the PRINCIPAL  
_ **|** _I cant believe im actually being thrown out_

**Sicheng**  
| _sorry I was beyond exhausted_ ****  
**|** _maybe they will offer you to retake the exam or take the new course and the old one together next year_  
**|** _just as I said before, this isn’t the end of the world_  
**|** _many students have faced this, if they will make you leave, youll find a way to work it out_

Before Sicheng can exit the app and lock his phone, Taeil asks if he was texting Kun, which he denies. Taeil asks if he should text their friend, it’s 1:17 pm when the message is sent.

**Yuta**  
| _what are the chances **  
**_ **|** _were adults not children, life doesnt throw second chances at us anymore_

**Sicheng**  
| _youre still very young in your university staff eyes_ ****  
**|** _youre just stressed now, think about positive aspects_  
**|** _you have a whole summer to figure out what to do_ ****  


Kun doesn’t answer. Both males get impatient and slightly worried, Kun isn’t a man who just disappears without giving a notice. At this point Sicheng is straight up hungry, so they order the food, deciding if Kun ends up showing up, he’s going to order by himself _and_ he’s going to pay

**Yuta**  
| _we’ll see how it ends_ ****  
**|** _Wednesday, 3 pm **  
**_ **|** _tune in next week to see if yuta will break up with his university_

To be honest, Sicheng feels bad for Yuta. Yuta told him that he thought he had aced the exact exam, and now it will be the reason he’s going to be kicked out of the university. It frustrates Sicheng, because he can’t imagine himself in such a situation and doesn’t know how to comfort his friend. He can type whatever he wants and tell him through calls anything that comes up in his mind, but he has to admit that talking about it in real life would be a lot easier.

He doesn’t want to let to get it to him right now, his day isn’t going wonderful either. Still no sign of Kun, the one and only who is to blame for Sicheng being here, and he’s here with Taeil, which is burdensome in a way.

 They sit silently, waiting for their food and sipping on what’s left from their drinks, Taeils phone lays almost in the middle of their table, waiting for an answer from Kun. Café is relatively crowded, it is a Saturday after all. People around them are chatting non-stop, so they rather listen to their gossips than having their own. Or at least that was what Sicheng thought.

“How has Kun… been?” Taeil gives a shot to another conversation that probably won’t last long, “When he was over, he mentioned his girlfriend, but… not in a good way?” His face twists in a questionable expression.

“Yeah… they haven’t been good in the past few months.” Sicheng thinks whether he should tell more or not, since it’s not about his private life, but decides to keep the conversation going.

But his friend beats him to it, “Oh. I just thought you would know more, since you two have been hanging out very often.”

“No, yes. I do.” The younger takes a quick sip from the cup and puts his arms underneath the table, “You know, they wanted to get married, right? Well, maybe it was only Kun, but for me it seemed like they both were dreaming about it.” Taeil hums in response, so Sicheng continues, "So, they started to have arguments and at this point they pretty much don’t live together anymore.”

“I see.” Taeil plays with the black straw sticking out from the cup, “Why do you think ended up like this?”

“Honestly, I don’t know. They always were so close.” He’s playing with his fingers, doubting if he should tell about his guess, “You know, Kun’s very affectionate and caring. Maybe it was too much for her. After all she’s still young and probably wants a lot of freedom. Maybe Kun controlled her in a way and she realised she won’t be able to escape after marriage.”

Taeil nods his head in agreement, “Maybe she found someone better.”

“And she couldn’t tell it straight to his face? Rather make such a scene? She didn’t seem like such a person.”

“You think there wouldn’t be a scene then?”

“Not at least as angry as this one.”

“Yeah, but we all have different tactics.” Taeils phone vibrates, he takes a sip before reaching for it and Sicheng can hear him silently breathe out and mutter “ _don’t we_ ”. Sicheng watches him unlock his phone, a few taps on the screen and his friend chuckles, “Bingo.”

Taeil turns his phone to Sicheng. There are only a few short messages, up until the one he had sent today. Taeil had asked where Kun has disappeared, to what, more than half an hour later, he replies “ _im helping my **ex** girlfriend to move out :) it was now or probably never” “got too busy carrying the boxes” “I wont make it today, I owe you two”_ _“sorry”_.

 

* * *

 

 

The food arrives not too long after they finally finish their drinks. Sicheng’s more than hungry by now, so he doesn’t hesitate to shamelessly consume everything that is on his palate as fast as possible. There’s little to no talking left, as Taeil seems to be pretty hungry too.

Sicheng’s first to finish, he feels too full to even think about any desserts, so he’s left to wait for Taeil and who knows what is going to happen after. He really tries not to bring out his phone again, so the boy tries to find something eye catching in their surroundings.  

There aren’t any interesting people he could secretly stalk. Bunch of middle aged people are enjoying their free time, some pensioners slowly are chewing their food. Younger people just come and go ordering some drinks and sweets. It would be nice to eat outside, it would be nice to have a picnic. Sicheng can’t recall the last time he had a nice picnic with his friends or family, he should try to organise something in June. He hasn’t really been out with other people than Kun or Ten, on rare occasions, Taeyong, nor have they hanged out all together. _Or_ Sicheng hadn’t been invited, but Ten would have let it slip in one of their conversations.

Now, that Kun will have more free time, they could talk about a road trip. Although, he hasn’t been fantasizing about places he’d like to go.

“Are you trying to summon someone?” The boy is awaken from his thoughts, Sicheng realises he has been looking at the entrance door, zoning out.

“I’m just thinking.”

“About what?”

Sicheng has come up with some plans for summer, but he hasn’t told about any of them to Taeil, not even about China, so he’s not sure if he wants to tell about them now, “Cats.”

“You’ve been thinking about cats?” Taeil turns his head to the doors, Sicheng guesses he’s trying to find the animal somewhere outdoors.

“Yeah, what if we get a cat?” Saying it out loud feels different than thinking about it once a week when Yuta asks. A hint of concern settles in his stomach.

Taeil scrunches his face, “Like, a real cat? At home?”

The tone his friend said the last sentence makes Sicheng cautious. To be fair, the boy always thought that if he ever would bring it up, Taeil would agree, because he definitely doesn’t hate pets and he would probably take a better care after them than Sicheng himself.  
“I mean… it’s just a thought, you know.” Sicheng feels less enthusiastic than before, “It’s summer and… there is more time to look after it. But, yeah, maybe not, it probably requires more attention than I think.”  
Time to time Sicheng thought about it how nice it would be to have a small ball of fluff run around the apartment, he would pet him when he would lay in his lap while watching TV, or how out-of-movie it would be to wake up with someone jumping on your bed and doing that kneading thing with their legs.

“No, no, I’m not against it.” Taeils tone changes to something defensive and so does his expression, “It just… came out of blue. But we can... adopt, or did you want to buy?”

 As much as he has wondered about having a pet, Sicheng has never thought he would get this _far_ in real life, “I think it would be better to adopt from a shelter, don’t you think?”

Taeil slowly nods, stuffing the last of his food in his mouth, “Yeah, I think so too. Are you thinking of a kitten or a grown one? Boy or girl?”

“I think a kitten won’t survive with us and probably a boy, because what if somehow, I don’t know how, the cat gets pregnant.”

“Just say you don’t like kittens and go.” The elder jokes, “I don’t mind. When do you think to go and pick it up?”

Sicheng chuckles before answering, starting to feel more playful, “Today.”

“No, I can’t today.”

Even if Sicheng joked, then Taeil took it seriously. He was reminded of the unsettling feeling in his body and it didn’t take much for the boy to be alert again. “Oh,” Sicheng drags, “Monday?”

Taeil doesn’t seem to be as positive as some minutes ago, “I’m busy before work on Monday… and our Tuesday plans don’t usually match.”  

“And I have practice before and after work this Wednesday, and I’d like to have some more sleep before next days long shift.”

“…And I have work again on Friday and Saturday.”

Sicheng smiles bittersweetly, hanging his head lower and gazing rather to table than his friend.

Taeils tone has dropped, “Seems like we won’t be able to do it together.”

The younger tries to lift up the mood, “We can do it after the next week?”

“No,” Taeil quickly denies, “it needs to be done as soon as possible, until we haven’t realised how bad of idea this is.”  It relieves Sicheng for a second, “I believe you should do it. It was your idea and I have some stuff to deal with.”

 

* * *

 

 

Once they finish, it’s around half past 3. Taeil asks if Sicheng would like to tag along to his football practice, which he denies, excusing himself by telling that he had a bad sleep last night and would like to take a nap after such a meal.  
The lunch didn’t turn out as awful as the boy thought it would.  
They have to take different busses, so they part their ways exchanging goodbyes.

Sicheng can finally use his phone freely. Turns out Yuta has been spamming him with messages and a few calls, making the boy worried again. He sits down, waiting for the bus

 **Sicheng**  
| _Yes, sorry, im here_ ****  
**|** _I was on a lunch with a friend_  
**|** _and we didn’t use phones_  
**|** _what happened?_ ****  


Yuta doesn’t check the new messages until Sicheng is already halfway to his home, who spends most of the ride looking through the window with a troubling feeling inside.

 **Yuta**  
| _sorry I didn’t mean to annoy you_ ****  
| _are you free atm?_ ****  
**|** _if not please call me when you are_ ****  
  


**Sicheng**  
| _its okay, my phone was on silent_ ****  
**|** _I’ll be home after like 15 minutes  
_ **|** _is that okay?_

Sicheng doesn’t know what to expect from this call, usually they would call each other in the middle of active chats. They day isn’t really soon to end, but it has been too much for the boy already. Too much of an emotional rollercoaster, combined with the poor sleep he got makes him extra tired for this hour. He should really plan a relaxing weekend trip. He should talk to Kun.

**Yuta**  
| _if its okay with you_ ****  
| _im left alone in my dorm room_  
**|** _jaehyun went home already_

Who’s Jaehyun?

**Yuta  
|** _you don’t need to answer, just call me as soon as you can_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So, I have a few things to say and lets start with the good ones:  
> I'm very thankful for everyone who has read at least a bit from this work! I know that my english and my writing skills aren't that good, but I'm glad that something that I started out of the need to expand my hobbies have been read by some of you. Truly, thank you! I believe there are around 4 or 5 more chapters left and I really hope to finish this story before summer starts.
> 
> WayV is having a comeback! I really can't wait for the new songs. Let's hope Sicheng gets some proper lines!!!
> 
> Also, I'd like to say special thanks to the people who are subscribed to this work. There aren't many of you, but you are one of the biggest reasons I keep on writing this work.
> 
> And... not so good one:  
> My last two(?) updates have been late and so will be the next one. This and the last chapter didn't come as easy as the previous ones and my usual free time had been occupied with other stuff. However, I'm leaving for a 6 day trip this weekend and I won't be taking my laptop with me (and I'm not a fan of writing on the phone lol), there probably won't be an update until next weeks end or even the week after that. 
> 
> Thank you again!!!


	10. Chapter 10

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm not good with dialogues, sorry lol

When Sicheng gets home, he texts Kun asking if it would be okay if he calls him later today. While continuing to change into some comfier clothes, the boy searches for Yutas number in his phone. He feels worried, they will probably talk about his friends trouble, Sicheng enjoys that Yuta sees him as a person he can trust and talk about stuff that bothers him, but he’s running out of ways to comfort him and is afraid that he may find a person to replace Sicheng then.

By habit, Sicheng finds the video call button and presses his finger on it. The boy makes himself cozy under the blanket only in four beeps until Yuta declines the call and the fifth one doesn’t come. Sicheng’s confused, but it takes less than 10 seconds for the other to call back in a regular voice call. It confuses the boy for a second, but he doesn’t think much about it.

“Hey, what’s up?” Sicheng tries to start it off enthusiastically, with his mood still somehow being good after the brunch.

However, the voice on the other end clears its throat and cracks a barely audible, “The sky.” followed by a dry chuckle.

Sicheng waits a few seconds for a proper interdiction which doesn’t come, “You don’t sound so good.”

“I didn’t even say a full sentence. Is it _that_ visible?” Yuta truly sounds tired, sleepy or drained, Sicheng can’t tell, either way it makes him feel more and more sympathetic.

“Did you mean audible?” The boy tries to lighten up the mood, “I mean, you _do_ have a reason to be… sad.”

The other doesn’t answer for a second, “Yeah… To be honest, I don’t know why… I made you call me. Sorry.”

Sicheng scrunches his face, the calls usually came naturally, but neither this is the first time when Yuta had actually asked him for a call, “There’s no need to be sorry though…? You know-”

“That I can talk to you, yes, I know. But I have nothing else to talk about than… whine and cry about how I messed up.” Yuta sighs, “And I’m sorry for wasting your time.”

“You’re not wasting my time…” Sicheng feels bad about this, he hopes that his friend doesn’t really think like that. Sicheng wishes that he could be like Yuta, that he could open up easily and get things off the chest by talking to somebody, but he can’t, so he believes that the least he can do is be that _somebody_ to someone, so they wouldn’t feel like the way he does. “I’m happy that you talk to me about it and other things that trouble you, rather than bottle them up.”

Luckily, Yuta chuckles, “You’re happy to be a therapist for free?”

“As a part of the broke student community, I am obligated to help.” Sicheng laughs at his own joke, exhaling a deep breath after. “Well…what is up?”

“Jaehyun left this morning and now I’m alone in the room, so I have all the time to sulk by myself.”

“Who’s Jaehyun though?” Sicheng asks curiously, Yuta mentions some of his teammates here and there, but that name has never been brought up.

“He’s my roommate in the dorms… haven’t I told you?”

He feels remarkably relieved by the given answer, “Not that I can recall. But back to being sad, any new plans?” He knows that Yuta isn’t planning to tell his parents, yet, but neither he knows how or when he will.

“I did look for the work offers, both for the summer and, you know, overall, but, I don’t know… I don’t have any motivation to do anything.”

“It has been, like, what, a day?” It really has been this little time and his friend has pretty much turned down every idea they have come up with, “You’re still in a shock state or whatever you call it. Maybe you need some real human talk right now.”

“Aren’t you a real human?”

“You know what I mean.” They both know, but it’s always hard to admit.

 The last sentence is followed by a moment of silence, before the brunet speaks up, “I know, but… it’s easier to talk to you.”

Sicheng lets the answer settle in him, “Yeah, still… I can’t, like… it’s not the same.”

Sometimes Sicheng thinks how it would be to meet Yuta in real life. He doubts whether he’s really as nice and charming as he is through the phone screen or if he really has such an interesting life or things that he had told are lies, because it wouldn’t be hard to. But Sicheng believes him, he likes the idea of having a secret good-looking friend that none of people around him knows.  
Once he came up with an idea to go to Japan for a few days, some time after the trip to China. He could earn a little more money and talk to his boss about a few extra days off. Sicheng has been a reliable employee, so he’s pretty sure that the administration won’t mind.  
He may or may not spend that time in Osaka wandering around, with a small hope that he might see the familiar brown haircut or the other would notice his own. The boy knows how out-of-movie it sounds, but wouldn’t it be amiable? But if they really meet, Sicheng hasn’t come up with an excuse of how he suddenly is in his friends hometown and hadn’t mentioned visiting Japan to him.  
And what would they do after? Sicheng would be there 5 day max and he probably would be staying somewhere in the city, meanwhile Yuta lives more on the countryside.

Yuta sighs on the other end, but Sicheng can feel the goofy smile through his voice, “Don’t get sad because of me. Did I ruin your Saturday plans?”

Sicheng tries to cheer this conversation up, “Nah, I had enough for the day the moment I woke up. The lunch was too much for me, I could be taking a nap in the best case. “

“I’m bored and haven’t done pretty much anything. Almost everyone has left dorms and only people I don’t know have left. I want to go home too, but at the same time, like, I don’t.”

“I don’t know how all the sports things work, but can’t you just start playing it professionally or something?”

Yuta chuckles, “Thank you for thinking that I’m _that_ good at it. But no, I haven’t been scouted and, yeah, it would be cool and all, but something intimidates me. Like you and dancing.”

Sicheng gets comfier in his bed. “At least they keep us in shape.” the remark leaves a positive twist on the other. “Lets talk about something more positive.”

 

* * *

 

 

The conversation goes just like any others – they lose the track of thoughts and time. Sicheng brings up the fact that he finally is getting a cat, once he gathers all his energy and pays a visit to the local shelter. Yuta says that that is sweet and that the younger won’t talk to him as much, as now he’s going to have a pet to curl up with when he’s sad rather than texting his friend, Sicheng’s quick to deny. Yuta tells about Johnny planning to come visit him later this summer and the elder seems to brighten up at the idea, making not only himself, but also Sicheng happy. They both wonder what should they have for dinner, coming to a conclusion that a cup of instant noodles a few times a week aren’t _that_ bad of a meal.

When the call has taken some time and the evening has approached, turns out that neither of them have the main component, to what Yuta suggests a dumb idea, “Lets both go to a store and buy them, so we can continue talking.”

Sicheng debates whether he wants to leave his bed, but it sounds so foolish, that the boy laughs while accepting the offer.

They put their phones down while getting ready, describing every little thing they do to each other. From which shelf Sicheng takes out a clean grey shirt to Yuta smoothing his bed after getting up from putting his shoes on. They create a playful atmosphere, even though they are nowhere near each other. Sicheng leaves the house with bouncy steps, Yuta chats with the dorm supervisor for a second. The younger has a longer track to walk, so Yuta walks slowly, just so they would arrive at the destinations at the same time.

If Sicheng would do this with anyone else, it would be cringy, but it’s not. Maybe because they have never met or they can’t see their reactions, the boys being a constant smile on the face, as he tells about everything he encounters on his way, the other does the same.

When the younger arrives at the store first, Yuta jokes about walking too sluggish and orders for the other to wait outside until he reaches it too and Sicheng does. It’s strange asking how fare are you, when no one is going to turn up, especially when the boy lets out a “Lets go in!” staring into nothing ahead of himself.  
But it’s even stranger when Sicheng is standing next to another male customer at the noodles section and his friend speaks his mind, “Wow, isn’t this like a date?” He couldn’t have been prepared for that, so his phone speaker has been set to be almost at the full volume, so outside the cars wouldn’t disturb them. There’s no way that the stranger didn’t hear that, since the small shop is almost silent, with only 3 or 4 customers being here. He doesn’t know how to respond to that, but his body gets hot and, even though he can’t see it, his cheeks definitely turn rosier than just the slight tint from the walking. He has to rub his eyes to adjust the sight and continue to examine the different flavours. Keeping himself together seems to be harder than he would have thought, but the guy next to him helps in a way.  
If Sicheng had stayed in the bed he would probably be burying his face into one of the soft pillows and whining about how embarrassing that was right now.

Sicheng picks up a pack of noodles and, while pretending to examine them, answers, “That was just as bad as the onion flavoured noodles I’m looking at.”

That seems to satisfy Yuta as he laughs and they keep on with their evening activity.

It starts to rain slightly as the boy starts to get closer to his home, the sky has gotten darker and is covered by thin clouds. His hand is starting to hurt from constantly being in one position, but, nonetheless, the call doesn’t end.  
By the time they actually get to the cooking part it’s almost a downpour outside. Sicheng doesn’t know if such weather was supposed to be or is this just one of those storms after a stifling day.

They eat, talking way less than before. It has been hours and it feels like they have talked about everything they could, the late hour isn’t helping – neither of them had a decent amount of sleep last night and the sleepiness is starting to set in quickly.   

Both ends agree to finish the call as soon as their bowls are empty. They send extra goodnights through messenger before Sicheng goes to sleep.

 

* * *

 

 

Sicheng remembers about Kun only when he calls the younger in the morning to announce that he’s coming over. He knows that Kun doesn’t really care about how tidy or not their house is, but the boy still gets up to have a look around, just in a case something is very off.

The elder arrives around an hour later with bunch of different foods _‘to make up for yesterday’_ , he’s quick to notice the absence of Taeil. Only then Sicheng starts to think back if his flatmate was even home, when he returned from the store, he’s not sure.

Kun starts to unpack different types of sweet and salty buns and rolls, some sandwiches with different kinds of meat and even a cake, “Coffee’s on you though.”

Sicheng makes his way to Taeils room. He softly knocks on the bedrooms door, awaiting for some kind of response, but the other side of the room stays silent. The boy slowly opens the door only a little bit, but enough for him to see what’s going on inside. Everything’s still dark, the curtains seem to be still closed, so he’s probably still sleeping.

And he is. The second thing the boy lays his eyes on is the curve under the light bed covers, slightly rising up and falling down again.  
He calls Taeils name in order to wake him up, but the other gives zero reaction to it, so he repeats his action – still nothing.  
He could let him sleep, but Kun owes them both, not only to Sicheng, so it would be only fair to disturb the other.

The boy silently makes his way to the elder and, as in slow-motion, puts his hand on one of Taeils shoulders, slightly nudging him and repeatedly saying his name. It takes a few times before the other responds. If you can call a round of coughs a response. Taeils voice doesn’t sound better, the first “Yeah?” doesn’t even come out properly, he has to clear his throat and do it again.  
Sicheng says that Kun is here and has brought breakfast because of yesterday. Taeil nods and tells that he is going to join them in a moment.

Sicheng goes back to kitchen and prepares three cups of coffee. Kun helps to set everything on the table. They’re done before Taeil joins them, Sicheng’s two muffins in when he finally makes his way to the table.

“Well, you’re not looking good.” Kun seems to think the same way as Sicheng _or_ he can actually read minds.

“You too, good morning.” Taeil sits in his usual seat, opposite Sicheng, “The rain got me and my summery outfit good.”

“Yeah, the weather was so good yesterday. Sad that I missed such a nice day.”

They go on with the meal, mostly talking about Kuns relationship and summer plans. Sicheng mentions the idea of going on a trip somewhere, nobody of them seem to mind, the boy doesn’t bring up the part that the idea originally includes only two people.

They finish with jokes about Kun being forgiven. Kun throws in that they should go out more now, since they all are single. Sicheng curiously waits for the answer from Taeil, “Hell yeah, I’m definitely in the shape to drink right now.”  


 

* * *

 

 

Taeil falls sick. Judging by the symptoms and their combined knowledge, it’s a simple cold, but a little bit stronger than usually.  
At first he didn’t want to accept the defeat and actually got ready and went to the work Monday morning, but Sicheng had been barely woken up when he had returned back home by the order of his manager.  

Before Sicheng leaves for his own work, Taeil asks him to buy some medicine and returns to his room, probably to go back to sleep.

Sicheng has already forgotten how it feels to not be home by himself or at least have somebody else who makes their presence noticeable.  

Before the shift starts, he stops by the promised pharmacy and a small store near his café to pick up some products, so he would be able to cook a proper meal for himself and Taeil later. It has been a while since he has cooked for two or has done a serious grocery shopping, so he’s a bit lost in the ideas of what meals he’ll prepare and how much of everything he needs.  

The shift passes quickly, as more and more people start to come around due to the summer breaks and vacations keeping Sicheng occupied all the time. Around this time of the year, the café has a nice atmosphere during evening shifts. Customers chatting everywhere around and ordering only light foods and fancier drinks, the lights in the rooms are dimmer as everyone starts to depend on the daylight. That gives a great opportunity to catch the colourful sunsets through the large glass windows.  
If usually Sicheng doesn’t use his workplace to have a meal, then on days like these he allows himself a cup of tea and a piece of cake after his shift.

Not today though.  
Today he hurries to get back home as soon as possible. It’s already almost 9 pm when he makes back from work, considering that he likes to get a few extra hours of sleep before Tuesday morning shifts, it’s a late hour for Sicheng. He still needs to cook something and make sure that his flatmate will survive until he wakes up tomorrow or even after his shift.

Taeil is in his room, but the half-full glass of water on the coffee table indicates that he had left his bedroom at some point. Sicheng brings it back to the kitchen and puts it near the sink, noting to wash it once he’s going to wash the dirty dishes from dinner.  
At first he thinks about bringing the medication to Taeil, but he believes that it is better to take them on not-empty stomach, so he starts with dinner. It ends up being a simple rice with creamy chicken. The boy puts a generous amount of the meal in a secure enough bowl to eat it while being in bed. From the cupboard, he takes a bigger glass and fills it with fresh water.

He stuffs the requested packages in his pockets and makes his way to Taeils room with the dish and the glass in both hands.

The room has gotten lighter due to the opened curtains. Taeil quickly notices Sicheng entering his room and patiently waits for him to place everything on the nightstand next to his bed. The younger tells him to eat something, which he does, while listening to the boy trying to explain what medicine is for what and how often he should take it. The bowl sits in Taeils lap as he lazy lifts the utensil to his mouth and back to the dish. Behind his back are three pillows to hold him at least a bit up, but not enough to safely drink the water, so Sicheng helps him up.  
Sicheng puts the pills in his friends hand, while his own are behind Taeils shoulders to make sure he stays up and the other holds the glass against his lips. While he sips on the refreshing water, one of the boys hands easily picks up on the heat that comes from the other body. Sicheng lets himself take a proper look at Taeils face, as he gulps the water in the need to feel something chill in his body with his eyes closed, small droplets of sweat are visible on his forehead, the boy thinks about how bad the others condition might be. He can feel how Taeil more and more leans on his arm.

When the elder takes all of the medicine Sicheng brought him and he has drank all the water, he asks to refill the glass. The boy does so, but when he makes it back, Taeil seems to have fallen asleep in the short amount of time. Sicheng leaves the water on the same nightstand, taking the empty bowl with him as he starts to make it back to the kitchen for a short clean-up.

 

* * *

 

 

Throughout the whole time he spends in the kitchen, as he make his bed and changes into the sleepwear, as he lays in his bed, trying to find a good position to fall asleep, there’s that familiar weight on his chest. Although it has been a while since he had an encounter with it, he recognises it easily.

Maybe you could rephrase it as the feeling of need to help somebody, to make someone feel better, to express sympathy or as the feeling that you want to let yourself to let feel needed to somebody again.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> !! WayVs !! comeback !!  
> I'm >:0 , YOU CAN CLEARLY HEAR SICHENGS VOICE i CRIED
> 
> The trip was a rollercoaster, but I'm back and, even though the last weeks of school is getting to me, I have planned the whole next chapter, so it should be up next week.
> 
> Also, I have finally caught the "stan loona" and New, Egoist & Sweet Crazy Love are so good songs damn


	11. Chapter 11

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> this chapter is MESSY messy as I wrote like a paragraph and the next one only like 3 days later, also read my excuses below

Before leaving for work, Sicheng wakes Taeil up to remind him what medication he should take, that there are leftovers in the fridge and, if he needs anything, Sichengs phone will be with him all the time.

However, Taeil doesn’t text.  
The shift passes way slower than yesterday, surprisingly, there are more people than expected _and_ they seem more annoyed than usually. Surely, the bad sleep he got last night only adds. Sicheng doesn’t waste a minute to leave the place, he’s off as soon as the clock shows the godly hour of the end of the shift.

He arrives at home quickly, head full of thoughts about naps. The boy quietly unlocks the door, believing that any slightest noise would bother his flatmate. Stepping into the space, he’s glad he has done so, as Taeil, from what Sicheng sees, is sleeping. The TV is playing some kind of crime show, a few gunshots can be heard, they don’t wake up the elder though.

While taking off his shoes, the boy notices the empty dishes placed on the coffee table in the living room. He’s going to clean it up later, right now all he wants is to lay down in his soft bed for at least 5 minutes, or an hour. While turning off the TV, he throws another glance at Taeil before disappearing in his room.

And he does take a nap, definitely not the best one he had. He wakes up alarmed, as someone is loudly coughing somewhere outside his room. His first instinct is to jump out of his bed and rush to check what is happening, but he stops at the first part. Sicheng only sits up, when he suddenly feels a headache spreading inside his skull. It feels very unpleasant, the boy scrunches his face and waits till the rush of pain slightly calms down.  
It takes a few minutes for him to get up, but as soon as he does he is out of his room, to find some painkillers in their medication drawer in the kitchen.  
Obviously, the cougher was Taeil, who gives Sicheng a weak _Hi_ to what the boy gives back a small smile, not stopping, just rushing to the other room.

He takes one pill and goes to pick up the dirty dishes from the living room, to what his friend tries to argue – that _he can do it himself, but later, when he feels better._  
Sicheng washes the dishes and puts them on the dryer. The time is something over 4 pm or maybe 5 pm already. He could make dinner sooner and go back to sleep and let the pill do me its magic. The boy checks the fridge and some cupboards, a few ideas of meals he could prepare pop in his mind.

Sicheng goes back to the living room, “Any wishes for dinner?” he asks standing at the end of the sofa, looking down at Taeil who seemed to be dozing off again.

Taeil reacts quickly, turning on his back, finding Sichengs eyes with his own tired ones, “Uh, I don’t really care,” his voice sounds deeper and husky, “I’m not hungry.”

“Yeah, but you will be later.”  The boy moves his eyes from the others face to gaze out of the window, “And you _should_ eat.”

“No, really, it doesn’t matter what you make.”

“Well,” Sicheng crosses his arms, not giving in so easily, “I should make something you carve, so you would eat it and get better soon.” His look travels back to his friend.

Now Taeil is the one to turn away, Sicheng can see him thinking, “Chicken with some vegetables?”

It’s a pretty simple wish, Sicheng was prepared to make a full course meal, since he gets pretty hungry while being sick, “Chicken with some vegetables it is then.”

Sicheng takes another painkiller and gets to cooking.

 

 

* * *

 

 

 

It doesn’t take much time for the dinner to be ready, about more than an hour later they’re both sitting on the sofa. Sichengs head still slightly hurts, making him touch or rub his temples more often than he’d like to, however, he’s still eating more than Taeil does.

Taeils still pretty much in a sleeping position, a few more pillows than usually under his head and shoulders. They’re _watching_ a game show, it’s nothing interesting, but Sicheng haven’t found anything better. The warm room, food and the headache makes him relatively sleepy for this hour.

“How was work?” Taeil seems to have noticed.

The younger shrugs, stabbing the fork through what’s left on his plate, “Not the best, not the worst.”

“You look tired,” The elder notes, placing the halfway finished bowl of food on the table, “Thanks, it’s great, but I just can’t.”

Taeil snuggles more into the pillows, making himself more comfortable, to continue staring to the TV thoughtlessly. Sicheng does the same. He finishes his own food and puts the dish next to the half full one. “Ready for the medicine?” Taeil grunts and the other takes that as a positive answer, “They’re in your room?”  This time the elder gives a hum.

Sicheng gets up, his head goes a little dizzy and it takes him a few seconds to focus on the task again.

Taeils room is still dark, before he takes the boxes, the boy opens the window to let in some fresh air before the night.

Sicheng takes out the pills for his friend and brings fresh water from the kitchen. Taeil takes everything the younger gives to him and, as soon as he is done, curls up under the duvet and closes his eyes. Sicheng’s tired too, but he decides to stay in the living room for a while. He will rest a little bit and regain some strength, then clean up the dirty dishes and put back the medicine. He turns down the volume of TV and bends his legs, so he could fit them on the free space left on the sofa.

 

 

* * *

 

 

 

Sicheng wakes up, when he tries to get into more relaxed position by stretching his legs and they hit someone else. He quickly startles up, bringing his legs back to him, from his sleeping spot, the TV has been turned off and the room has gotten murky. The boy sits like that for a while, looking out of the window, until he remembers about the window he opened before passing out.

This time standing up he doesn’t get dizzy, neither does his head hurt anymore. This nap was a better one indeed. He goes to Taeils room, which now is not only full of fresh air, but also definitely has gotten some degrees colder. As he closes the curtains, he thinks if bringing his friend back to his room for a proper night sleep is a better idea, than not waking him up and letting sleep on the sofa… from which he could easily fall off. Yeah, that’s a reason good enough to bring him here.  
Before leaving, the boy prepares Taeils bed and checks the digital clock on the nightstand, 10:09 pm.

He goes back to the living room, before waking the other up, he carries away the dishes and takes one of the water bottles, he bought earlier, with him.

Sicheng quietly approaches his peacefully sleeping friend. His looks wanders on the elder more than it should, debating if waking him up really is the right choice.  
But he will be way more comfortable in his own bed, right?  
So, Sicheng slightly nudges Taeils shoulder, to what he doesn’t respond. The boy does the same thing the second time, only with tiny bit more force and quietly whispers his friends name, still not succeeding. Maybe he should just let him sleep.  
He is going to give it another try, if nothing will change, he’s just going to sleep. But Sichengs _wants_ him to wake up, so he does, what he used to do all the time.  
The boy squeezes elders noise closed and waits till the other responds, which, this time, works very quickly. Taeil doesn’t seem exactly happy by the action and shifts around a few times, only then paying attention to his friend.

Sicheng takes that as an indication to speak, softly, “It’s late, lets get you to bed.” Only after he finishes the sentence, he realises he didn’t even give a choice to his friend.

But Taeil doesn’t seem to mind, he mutters barely audible _Yeah_ and sits up without a hurry, keeping the blanket around him. Sicheng hasn’t seen him in such a state for a while, and he doesn’t mean the “being sick” part. He means just-woken-up-Taeil, who manages to look like the grumpiest and the softest person in the world at the same time. His face still puffy from sleep, Taeil sighs, pulling the blanket closer to his body with one hand and using the other to rub his eyes in order to be more awake.  
Sicheng just stands waits for some more time, using this chance to mindlessly stare at his friend, taking in his drowsy appearance. Without much thinking, the boy extends his hand and ruffles Taeils brown locks.  The other takes it as a sign to start getting up, Sicheng is quick to react and pulls his hand away from the hair, instead moving his body closer and curling his arm around his friends back. He isn’t sure if Taeil actually needs his support, he probably doesn’t to be honest, but neither does he protest, so Sicheng just moves with a relatively slow pace towards the prepared bed, Taeil against his side.

He carefully places the elder in the bed and helps to bring the duvet over his body. He places the water bottle, so Taeil can reach it easily and goes to sleep himself.

“Goodnight.”

“Goodnight.”

 

 

* * *

 

 

 

Sicheng wakes up surprisingly in a good mood and, what it feels like, full of energy. He remembers that today is Wednesday, that Yuta has a meeting with the principal, but there’s still plenty hours till that. He is worried, no doubt, but he’s feeling too good to let it get to him.

He doesn’t spend much time rolling around in bed and scrolling through his phone. Instead he decides to make a proper breakfast, which he hasn’t done in some time. Since last weeks of school, he has been living off of coffee and some buns or a sandwich, just something to survive till lunch.

But, shower first.

When he’s done, he doesn’t bother putting all things away properly, just throws everything on the bed and is off to make coffee and food. Everything seems to be going smoothly, he puts the water to boil, finds the needed ingredients for grilled cheese sandwiches, until the kettle is whistling and he has to get the cups from the shelf, does he need one or two?

Taeil hasn’t woken up yet, well, at least he hasn’t left his room. Sicheng does what any good friend would do, he goes to the elders room, knocks on the door a few times before coming in, opens the door slightly and peaks through it. Taeil is not sleeping, he’s up, laying on his side with the phone screen in front of him, the water bottle now is more than halfway empty.

“Morning.” Taeil looks up from his phone screen, it can be easily told by his voice, that his throat still is sore.

Instead of wishing a good morning back, Sicheng smiles and asks, “Are you joining me for breakfast?” The elder doesn’t answer immediately, seems to be thinking about it, “In, like, 15 minutes.” It’s a yes or no question, Sicheng thinks there shouldn’t be much doubt about such an easy choice.

Taeil positively hums.

 

 

* * *

 

 

 

They sit like usually, Sicheng with his back to window and Taeil opposite him, having the city scene with the younger in front of him.

The boy guesses that his friend should be getting better by the way he doesn’t hesitate to reach out for the third time to refill his dish with a small portion of the fresh salad, but his face still gives away his true condition. There still isn’t a lot to talk about, but it feels way more comfortable now, it feels almost like it used to do. Taeil asks about the others work a lot, mentions that they have never had properly eaten there, Sicheng suggests that they should, when he’s properly back to his healthy self.

They finish off in the same chatter, Taeil offers help with cleaning up, which Sicheng turns down. Instead, the elder strides into the living room and Sicheng can hear him plop down on the sofa with a sigh.

 

* * *

 

 

Yuta hasn’t texted him anything today. Phones work both ways, so Sicheng decides to text first.

 **Sicheng _  
_ |** _how are we feeling?_

 

 

* * *

 

 

Sicheng tells Taeil where to find easy accessible food in the kitchen, asks if he needs any more medication and starts to get ready for work.  The weather is back to being summery – the sun in the middle of the day is heating everything in the city up, there’s barely any wind, just enough to not to get too sweaty. The weather forecast promises only days like these for the rest of this month, the chance of rain being very small.

The boy changes into lightly coloured clothes, says a final goodbye and is off to work.

The fact that Yuta hasn’t replied when Sicheng has already reached his bus stop starts getting to him. He could try calling him, but is it worth it, if Sicheng thinks about it, then it would be way more useful to get in contact with him after the work. The boy throws his phone into his bag and spends the time in bus thinking about how unexpectedly his life is going at the moment.

Even before the shift there are no signs of Yuta, he still has a whole hour till the meeting and, knowing his friend, he could be still sleeping. Hopefully.

 

  

* * *

 

 

It’s not the worst day at the work today, Sicheng feels almost as good as he did in the morning. When he exists the building, the air has gotten chillier, but it’s still warm enough to feel good in a t-shirt. Many people are walking around, not used to the good weather yet, thinking that it will be gone soon again. Sicheng would love to wander around the streets for some more time and enjoy the company of strangers and the calm atmosphere.

He can’t spend too much time out, he has chores to take care of. Sicheng goes to the next bus stop, instead of the closest one, he’ll have to settle with that today, there’s still plenty of evenings left this summer.

Only when Sicheng is sitting on the bus and thinks back about the previous bus ride, he recalls about the phone somewhere deep down in his bag. He almost unwillingly blindly looks for it, maybe even giving up when he doesn’t succeed with the first try, but he does find it with the second one and Sicheng deeply exhales. It feels like the back screen is staring back harder than Sicheng himself does, it takes more power than usually to press a button and unlock the phone. He knows that whatever he is going to see in the time span of the next two minutes will bring his mood down. But it feels bad leaving Yuta alone and when Sicheng expresses this loud in his head, it feels worse.

 

He isn’t sure what he expected, but definitely not only two messages from Yuta and some other unimportant notifications. The ride will come to an end soon and Sicheng will have to get off.

 

 **Yuta  
|** _idk just woke up_  
**|** _ill let you guess how it went_

 **Sicheng  
|** _hopefully good?_ **  
|** _sorry, technically I cant use phone at work_  
**|** _but im all ears now_

 **Yuta  
|** _no, you have to guess_

 **Sicheng  
|** _they offered you to re-take the course?_

 **Yuta  
|** _worse, try again_

 **Sicheng  
|** _D: they told you to leave?_

 **Yuta  
|** _worse than that, last try_

 **Sicheng  
|** _it can be worse than that??_

Sicheng gets off the bus, there aren’t any people at the stop, everyone who got off quickly disappears to different directions. The boy decides to sit on the bench until the next bus comes or Yuta answers him again. He nervously waits for the screen to light up again, fidgeting the phone around in his hands, glancing on the cars passing by. He could go somewhere nice this weekend, if Taeil gets better.

 **Yuta  
|** _I have to take the next course next year, and maybe even the next one the year after that :(_

 **Sicheng  
|** _can you translate it to my language?_

 **Yuta  
|** _!!!they didn’t kick me out, I didn’t even fail my exam!!!!_

 _Oh_ , he believes that if Sicheng would have failed an exam, he would be out long time ago. Also the not failing his exam thing confuses Sicheng, Yuta can’t be that dumb to not to understand if he had or not passed the exams and then sulk about it for days.

 **Yuta  
|** _yoo, im not an idiot_ **  
|** _when I walked in the principals office I immediately started to absolve and beg for mercy, but he was confused and then I was confused, and turns out he didn’t want to talk to me about the exam_   
**|** _and I was ???? I explained the situation and then he was ???, turns out I received somebody elses results and I actually scored very good results, even though someone now will have to leave this place lol_

The relief that comes over Sicheng is unexplainable, a low chuckle leaves his lips. Another car drives by with a song playing loudly enough for it to settle into the boys thoughts and the he hums the rest of it.

 **Sicheng  
|** _what did you two talked about then?_

A different bus is soon to arrive, he doesn’t want to be here by that time, Sicheng believes that it confuses the driver, so he always tries to leave the stops as soon as possible. He decides to leave Yutas reply as a surprise to receive when he gets home and puts phone back in the bag. There aren’t any cars on the road that the boy can see, so he chooses to cross the road here, not bothering to walk to the crossing.

As Sicheng is about to step down from the pavement on to the road, he notices something laying almost right underneath his foot and is quick to yank his leg back to him. Slightly shocked from the quick motions, he doesn’t hear the sound that the object makes. After seconds the boy has regained his posture and carefully ducks down to check what that was.

When whatever Sicheng was about to step on to meows again, the boy realises that he’s looking at a poorly looking kitten. It looks like it has been laying there for a while, Sicheng looks around to spot any other cats that might be a part of his family, but finds none, neither there are any places that they could be hiding. Its light brown fur is full with dirt that has dried up halfway, its ears are back and the legs are bent close to its body. For a second Sicheng thinks that it is already dead, but another meow convinces him otherwise.

Sicheng sees that another car is quickly approaching, right on the side of road where the boy and the kitten is. Without much thinking, he picks up the small animal in his hands as carefully as possible. The car is close, but he successfully crosses the road anyway and continues his way back home, holding kitty in his crossed arms, close to his own body.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ok so idk, I guess I had a writers block? also the school was chaotic and i had to take many extra tests to get a scholarship, but i got it >:-)   
> im on 3 months long summer break, so i might be updating faster than this, i HOPE i do, because i expected to end this by the start of the summer, but oh here we are! 
> 
> sorry!


	12. Chapter 12

 Taeil is playing video games in the living room when Sicheng arrives home. He doesn’t notice anything off about the younger, until the boy himself goes and stands in front of the TV, blocking Taeils view. The elder stares at whatever his friend is holding definitely way too close to his body, judging by the way of how bad that thing looks.

Sicheng continues to stay still, waiting till the other will realise what is going on, but seems like he won’t, “What are you holding?”

If Taeil would have thought about it more, he could have come to a conclusion, but the younger decides to blame it on him still being light-headed, “It’s a cat?” Sicheng isn’t sure if he meant that as a statement or as a question.

“Is it… alive?” The elder scrunches his face, showing the doubtful attitude towards whatever his friend is allowing to lay in his arms.

The kitten slightly moves, shifting deeper into Sichengs shirt and proving Taeil wrong for his assumptions. “Yeah?” The younger gets just a little bit defensive from his friends question, “Why would I bring home a dead cat?”  
Taeil keeps looking at the _thing_ Sicheng is holding and doesn’t say a word, meanwhile Sicheng is trying to burn holes through the other, the small flame of irritation burns more than it would usually. “I found him on the road, by out bus stop. It seemed to have been there for some time and nobody, who would take care of him, was around, so I…” He doesn’t finish the sentence, but neither is that needed.

“What if it’s like… sick or something? And you’re holding… it… like that.”

Okay, Sicheng admits the defeat on this one. The small animal wasn’t in a good condition, but it wasn’t openly bleeding or drooling on him, so _if_ it had some dangerous disease, the boy hopes he hasn’t caught it yet. He looks down on it, maybe he should put it down somewhere, the closest place being next to Taeil – on the sofa, but the elder probably won’t be happy about that.

“And we don’t have any stuff for it.”

“Do you want me to go and put it back outside?”

Taeil quickly stirs up, straightening his posture, “No! No, no… just, this is unexpectedly and _we_ aren’t quite ready.” For Sicheng it still feels like the elder is more against this creature, rather for it. “But, like, if we get him to the vet as soon as possible, then it would be cool to keep it, you know?”  

That wasn’t the most convincing reassurance, but for this moment, in which Sicheng doesn’t know where to put himself and the cat, it is enough. He slowly sits down next to Taeil, who at first backs away slightly making the youngers anxiety rise up, only to reposition himself in a second and leaning closer to inspect the muddy ball of fur. Sicheng lets his arms relax and the hold become more freely. The creature notices the shift in the resting environment and for the first time for others to see, turns its head and carefully looks around, taking in the new setting. Its eyes close and open slowly, neither does it turn its small head properly, probably from the feelings of exhaustion and unseemliness. After a short amount of time, in which both males have been doing nothing, just focused on whatever the cat is going to do next, Taeil discreetly nears his hand to the kittens head and waits for it reaction when what’s left between them is a small distance, which could be closed by the stretch of the humans fingers. The animal does nothing, so Taeil proceed with resting his fingertips between its ears, carefully avoiding a pair of dirty spots around them. As it doesn’t jerk away from the touch, he proceeds to move his fingers, scratching the fur ever so lightly to what the animal respond by closing its eyes pleasurably and leaning its head into the touch. Sicheng just watches the small interaction, too scared to move, just in a case he manages to break this moment. It feels like not a kitten is in his arms, but a small, fragile porcelain doll instead.

It is late and Sicheng has the long shift tomorrow, he also should manage to cook something for dinner. But first they decide to set something up that would work for as kittens sleeping and eating place for this night.  An unused, shallow cardboard box with an old towel in it comes together as a bed, if _something_ happens, they won’t be bitter about throwing them out. Sicheng places small cubes of chicken meat on a tea set dish and pours water in an extra small bowl and tiny bit of milk in another, they aren’t sure if the animal can eat such substances yet, but neither do they have anything better to provide. The cat lies on the sofa, while the two of them set up everything by the window in the living room.

It’s almost 11 pm when they are done eating, yet again – in the living room. The TV is playing a crime shows 4th season, meaning that neither of them what is going on, so rather than following the complicated plot, they talk about various of things, coming to an overall conclusion that they are going to shops to find everything they need for a kitty and that the animal needs to see a vet as soon as possible, hoping that they could squeeze in between others in help this Friday.

 

* * *

 

 

Sicheng wakes up from something falling and making it sound echoing through the apartment. His mind goes straight to the idea of the kitten, who has climbed somewhere high and now has fallen down. It takes him seconds to get out of his bed and rush to the shared space. As soon as he exits his room, the previous guess is shut down. Instead of a small cat laying helplessly somewhere on the floor, it is Taeil on the floor, with what seem like a broom in his hand, trying to get something out from underneath the sofa. He has heard his friend wake up and not minding to stop doing whatever he is doing, Taeil grunts a good mooring, followed by _guess where is our cat_. The boy looks at the spot they set up yesterday and it’s empty. Truly empty, all of dishes, except one bowl, where seems to be some leftover water, are completely clean. He throws a look around and until it hits him – it’s probably under the sofa, which turns out right, when Taeil confirms it by giving up the broom in his hands and switching to trying to pray it out with sweet words and the imitation of cat noises.

The younger thinks about helping his friend, but doesn’t really feel bothered about the fact that the kitty is currently hiding, it’s probably scared, he believes. But when Sicheng sits down on the sofa and the elder protests saying that it might use the space between the wall and the sofa as a restroom, Sicheng reconsiders the cats intentions and is quick to copy what Taeil is doing. It takes only about a few minutes for both of them to give up. Sicheng tells about his plan going to the store early, probably in the next half an hour or so, so he could have a proper meal before heading to the café. To the boys surprise Taeil asks to tell him when the younger is ready to head put, so he would be ready too. _I just have to get changed in something better, I already took a shower and I’m not really hungry._

Taeils health status has gotten better, meaning that soon Sicheng won’t have to pamper him like he has been doing in the past few days.

 

* * *

 

 

They leave without trying to find the kitten again, his food and drink supplies have been renewed, they hold to the hope that it won’t pee on any furniture or carpets while closing the entrance door behind them.

Per usual they take a bus to the store, exchanging thoughts about what they need to buy for the animal and what they should stock on overall.  
Even though the sun has lately been heating the city with no mercy, Taeil didn’t want to risk yet and is sitting with fully covered legs and light blue hoodie, whose soft sleeves constantly brush against Sichengs exposed right arm, making his skin tingle each time.  

It doesn’t take long before they arrive and start to discuss if it’s better to get connected food bowls rather than two separate ones or if the cat needs a round bed with a soft pillow in it, which, if purchased, would be more because of the fact that it matches Taeils sweater colour rather for the cat needs.

The food came a bit tricky, they weren’t sure how old is the animal and neither doesn’t really know how big of a cat should be in ones age. Sicheng also had to convince his friend to agree on getting a cat leash.  The elder had strong arguments against: _it’ll grow out of it quickly, what if doesn’t want to go outside, what if he doesn’t listen to you and you end up just dragging him around, you really want to walk around with a cat on the leash?_

Done with the kitten stuff and grabbing a few things they could find a use for home, the pair strolls to the food section. While scanning the different types of pasta, Sicheng yet again thinks about food he could prepare for everyday meals, but is slightly taken aback when Taeil joins in, noting what he would like to for Sicheng to make and what he himself could prepare, now that he is getting better. The shopping cart fills up quickly, the boy doesn’t want to imagine what amount of money they are about to leave here.

Sicheng’s the one in charge of pushing the heavy cart around and when they’re nearing the cashiers, Taeil suddenly disappears in between the high shelves with an _Oh!_ And leaves the younger in confusion, waiting for his return.

It doesn’t take long, but the people are starting to appear from what seems like nowhere and the lines are getting pretty long and Sicheng is about to leave the place and start standing in one too, so he couldn’t be home later than he hoped and would be able to take his time with the lunch. However, Taeil makes it. Taeil with a cake in hands makes it. He carefully places it in the cart, on top of the cereal boxes and before turning away to find the shortest line, flashes a smile to Sicheng,

“Cherry on top.”

 

* * *

 

 

  Sicheng makes a simple Chinese noodle soup per Taeils request and lets his friend deal with arranging everything they have bought for the kitty, the elder also makes a notice that he’ll try to call a vet once he is done.  
The boy is not only enjoying his food, but also the show that his friend unintentionally  puts up as the elder tries to explain the kitten for what is the litter box used for. However, the cat rather sits underneath the coffee table and doesn’t really pay attention to anything Taeil is trying to come around. The small animal still is pretty scared of them both, it doesn’t let them touch it much, so they haven’t managed to clean up him yet, but the cat doesn’t mind being in the human company.

It doesn’t seem to have any serious injuries, nor does it looks sick. Sicheng feels good about this one.

 

* * *

 

 

The lone time while being on the bus is finally the moment when Sicheng comes to opening the messages he had received from Yuta hours ago. He doesn’t intend to ignore his friends texts, it’s just that sometimes Sicheng just doesn’t feel like chatting even if he is feeling good. 

Scrolling through the plenty of “ _guess!” ”you have to guess” “wtf did u die”_ and the last _“ok, I didn’t want to tell you anyway”_ the boy smiles to himself. Even though Yuta might seem to be annoyed or actually take to heart the absence of answers, Sicheng knows that the other is just joking about or being sarcastic. And Sicheng likes to play back the same, the teasing goes back and forth until the conversation is completely pointless and here is nothing more to say. Then they just start over with a completely fresh topic, the previous chain of accusations not taken in mind.  

Sicheng plays along, answering with _“I wasn’t interest anyway,” “glad you caught up on that.”_

It doesn’t take long to receive an answer, as it should, he should be up by now, it’s nearing 2 in the afternoon.

_if I was you I wouldn’t say so ;)_

_:( sucks that you aren’t me then_

_now that that’s out of the way_

_guess what!_

The new about cat probably won’t be so much of a happiness to him than it is to Sicheng, but it was Yutas idea after all, so he should be updated about the new member of their apartment.

_ok jokes aside_

_I like literally have cool news_

_and youre kind of a part of them idk we’ll see_

_that sounds more scary than intriguing_

_you can start, im all ears_

_no, you start_

_my news are better than yours_

_save best for the last_

_bet_

_bet_

 

Sicheng sends an answer when he is already at work, last 5 minutes before his shift officially starts. He feels more excited about telling Yuta about his new pet, than getting to know whatever his friend is about to announce. And it might involve Sicheng himself? Yeah, that part seems kind of interesting to the boy, but not enough to keep the worry in his mind during the work hours.

_ok, so, yesterday when I got off the bus and was ready to go home_

_guess what I found!_

_AN ABANDONED KITTY_

_well, no more_

_I took him home and my friend didn’t mind and we bought him stuff today_

_he needs to see a vet tho, hopefully his health is ok_

_your turn?_

 

* * *

 

 

Sicheng doesn’t know what he expected and considering that he shouldn’t be surprised by what Yuta has answered him. But there he is, not only surprised, but also excited and maybe even slightly scared. To clear his thoughts and actually come around what is going to happen, the boy decides to get home by feet even if it means that he will arrive at home past 11 pm and another long shift awaits him the following day.

 

 

_so, long story short:_

_the principal called me in to tell me that I’ve received  
an offer from some scouts_

_everything’s cool, fucking dream come true, maybe._

_they didn’t invite me to immediately be a part of  
their team, buuuuuuuut_

_they do have a spot reserved for me on the  
summer camp they’re hosting_

_now the (possibly) best part:_

_if I accept it, then I’ll be spending a month in  
Seoul!!!!!!_

* * *

 

 

Don’t get him wrong, Sicheng would love to meet Yuta, he has been thinking about it more and more lately as his plans for a vacation are becoming more and more real. But he had more thought about it as _him_ going to Japan and maybe even surprising his friend, so if things don’t turn out smoothly, Sicheng would be the one completely in charge of how often he would meet the fellow. Just in a case Yuta still wouldn’t turn out to be the Yuta he has been presenting himself all this time.

_so, what do you think?_

But now that he might be coming to Sicheng? To here, where he already pretty much knows where Sicheng lives, where he usually goes or what he does everyday – that means that Yuta could find him here whenever he would like to. If Sicheng would go to Japan, then he could use the same things to _avoid_ the other, but this kind of situation he hasn’t even come up with.  

_we could meet up y’now_

Then again – how at this point the man can’t be Yuta. Sicheng knows so much about him, from serious things, like, why he tries to avoid any people on that one street whose name was similar to a keyboard smash, to dumb things such as why Yuta would love for her future daughter to wear exactly three hairpins on events. And they call each other so often. The younger knows how Yutas face, body looks like. How he always scrunches his face when talking about studies or how his face is flushed after another one of work-outs. When he has been eating good and he whines about the tummy he can get off as quickly as it appeared. He knows how Yutas voice sounds when he feels down or when he won another game, when he is deep in his thoughts at 3 am.

_if you don’t want it, that’s ok_

He definitely should sound better in real life and look way more handsome in 4D. Is Yuta more of a _lets meet for a coffee_ or a _hey, im outside, lets go for a ride_ guy? They haven’t really talked about dating further than announcing that they are single a few times months back, he might as well bring his other half with him. Such thought puts some weight in Sichengs chest. But how would Yuta look, sitting in Sichengs café, waiting for him to take a break? Taking place opposite him with two drinks on the table and a piece of cake for the elder, giving the usual _that’s on me_. Hopefully, the conversations would flow as freely as they did before. But everything would be real and ten times better than it is now. Seeing how the big, heart-warming smile build up and just talk with him. In real life. Confront him in real life. _Touch_ him, feel him being real.

_i know – I’ll accept the offer_

_so,  just think about it_

_if it helps,_

_id really like to see you_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> :((( sorry for the slow updates


	13. Chapter 13

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> this chapter ends at a strange point, but that's because it is cropped short, in order to keep them all around 3000 words, sorry :p

_we’ll see_

 

* * *

 

When Sicheng comes home, he didn’t expect to Taeil still be up, but nonetheless it’s a pleasant surprise. The boy is in the middle of slipping out of his footwear, when he hears his friends faint whispering, asking if it is him who is shuffling by the door.  Slightly interested in the quietness of the apartment, Sicheng quietly confirms that it is indeed him. Not wanting to interrupt the almost silence, he tries to make it to his room making as less sound as possible. The walk through the hall feels to be longer than usually and Sicheng takes his time, suppressing the growing curiosity of this evenings atmosphere.

Entering the living rooms space, he is greeted by the usual set up consisting of Taeil on the couch, a mug on the coffee table, an open window and a very silent, but bright TV. However, the smug look Taeil keeps on giving Sicheng shifts something in this scene.

Glaring back it his friend for a second, Sicheng grimaces his confusion, “What?”

“Think about it.” Taeil grins wider, waiting until the youngers brain will click and it doesn’t take long.

“Where’s the cat?” Sicheng moves to inspect the small bowls by the window, next to the blue cat bed and when everything is empty yet again, he turns back to the other and then things come to an explanation.

“Taeil – one, Sicheng – zero.”

The younger carefully takes a seat on the furniture, trying to shift it as less as possible, in order not to wake up the kitty who is sleeping on Taeils stomach, curled up on the soft blanket. Sicheng has to admit that such a move from the animal in the second day that it is spending here is quite unexpected, but cute nonetheless. To prove the upper-hand even more, the elder starts to gently pet cats fur while not breaking nor his expression or the gaze from Sicheng, who keeps on focusing his attention on the small creature. He builds up courage to extend his hand and try to lay his fingers on the soft fur too, but as soon as two of his fingers dip in the light-brown fluff between his ears, the kittens eyes pop open and it is quick to stand up and jump of the sleeping space, rather returning in the safe spot between the wall and the sofa.

“Well, you better refill his food supplies for that.”

 

* * *

 

 

Even though it is quite late, Sicheng stays up to have a chat about his work with the other, while having a snack instead of dinner and playing a game before sleep.

Taeil seems to be pretty much done with his week of weakness and is even up before Sicheng. It might already be 10 am and he hasn’t gone for a run another morning, but he feels good either way. Exiting the bedroom he is greeted by the elder will _sorry, I hope I didn’t wake you up, but actually I was thinking about waking you up._ Sicheng dismisses his worries, stating that he should be waking up soon anyways. Nowadays his usual summer morning routine consists of making a coffee straight away, then taking a shower while it cools down and then have something little for breakfast, so he could eat a proper lunch before work.

“You still drink coffee in the mornings?” Taeil asks, not paying much attention to his friend, rather cutting something Sicheng can’t see with a knife.

“I sure do.” He isn’t sure if the other heard the breathy laugh, “I can do it, I’ll make it better.” The boy tries to say the last part with a tint of sarcasm, so Taeil wouldn’t take it to heart.

And he succeeds, Taeil turns around with a put up hurtful face and his own tone is quite challenging, “You could… but I got out of the shower like 5 minutes ago, so the room probably still is pretty warm…” he waits for a second, dragging it until the younger gets his idea, finishing it by turning back around and continuing with chopping, “but if you insist, then make it two.”

 

* * *

 

 

It has been a while since Sicheng has done the hot outside – cold inside shower and _oh my god_ , he can already tell how good it is going to feel just by the way his pyjamas is quick to stick to his skin just by spending a minute into the bathroom. The mirror is fogged, but Sicheng is sure there isn’t anything new to see on his face and he looks good.  

As soon as his clothes are off from his body, it covers with a thin layer of sweat and drops of water from the steam. He puts the pieces of clothing mindlessly next to the sink and steps behind the shower screen, his body thrills from the minor excitement. He prepares for the chilly water to hit his warm skin for a minute and then quickly, without much thinking, he turns on the water flow. The first seconds feel painfully good, a mix of hiss and a groan even manages to escape his lungs. It feels better than ever in the summer heat. The bitter nibbling at his skin clears his head immediately and he focuses on washing himself and listening to the water stream.

Washing doesn’t take much time, but instead of getting out as soon as he is done, Sicheng stays there for a moment, this time letting his thoughts wander, while mindlessly massaging his body. His mind rushes back and forth – the kitten seeing the vet probably for the first time today, the dying plant on his desk, what should he make for lunch, Taeil making breakfast, should gather a meet with all of his friends, also should meet his boss and discuss the vacation, Yuta coming here, he should plan his trip around that.

 

* * *

 

 

Taeil tells about the fiasco the small and adorable kitten had caused at the vet, but turns out that he is in a very good condition, except for the fact that he hadn’t received any food for some time, that being the biggest cause of his tiredness. Yuta also manages to get Sicheng to talk to him in the late evening. He tells about the camp plan and the schedule he had received as soon as he handed in the requested documents. Apparently his parents are over the roof by the facts that their son has lasted another year in the university and had been offered such a deal. Sicheng doesn’t have much to brag about to his own family, but he knows that the visit will make them happy anyway.

Sicheng’s already in the bed when the call ends. Technically, he could go to sleep right now, but not like other times, he allows himself rethink about things happening and each time his thoughts wander back to Yuta, he lets himself get excited. Imagine a tall 22 year old rolling around in his bed and trying his best not to smile like child, just in a case someone could see him. But most of him didn’t care, who wouldn’t be happy about more than possibly meeting one of the hottest guys you have ever talked to and feel comfortable with?

The boy sometimes tends to compare himself to Yuta or Taeil and many times he had come to a conclusion that he’ s a contrast to them. Starting from the basics, such as height, voice tone or face shape, to things like being more introvert than them or not feeling so easy about talking to others about his own happiness or pain. _Opposites attract?_

But how is Taeil and Yuta compared to each other?    
They both keep themselves in a good shape, like video games, their studies are constantly going up and down, turns out Yuta even sings too. Sicheng can’t quite point many differences except for the different nuances in their looks. Maybe Yuta shows more that you have hurt him in a way and Taeil tends to be softer and more pampered than the other.

And in the end what does Sicheng like?

 

* * *

 

 

It’s only during the Saturdays lunch when Taeil asks him if he is going to join in with them tonight that Sicheng remembers about his friends birthday. He has no clue how he managed to forget _that_ , but the best he can do at the exact moment is to agree with going to their usual club.

That takes him to standing in front of his closet at the usual dinner time and wondering what is he going to wear. Not getting anywhere with that, he instead searches through one of the desk drawers in order to find one of the eye pencils Ten has left in his room and forgot about it soon after that. He succeeds finding a brown one, _although black would have been better_.  The boy returns to the built-in mirror in the closet door, he sits down on the floor with the legs crossed in front of him. He leans closer to his reflection and takes off the cap from the pencil. He shots another glance at himself, quickly examining his face. His skin has gotten even more tanner, even though he doesn’t spend much time outside during the day, also his face has gotten nicely rounder, Sicheng guesses that that’s a side effect from not running so much anymore. From how close he is to the surface, he can see his long, brown lashes and the different colours mixing together in his pupils. Strangely, his hair still seems fluffy, even though he hasn’t done pretty much anything today. He moves a few locks here and there, not parting his hair in front like he used to do, he rather lets the slightly curly bangs sit naturally. He tries to memorize how his hair looks, just in a case he ruins it by changing out from this shirt and is back to drawing a precise line on top of his eyelid.

Sicheng ends up dressing himself in the usual black jeans and a hot, dark red silk shirt, leaving the top buttons open for even better effect. He knows he looks good, with his phone in hand he tries out a few poses before getting the right one and taking a picture on the Snapchat app, he sends it to some people and now is left waiting for especially one response.

 

* * *

 

 

They make sure that the kitty will have enough food and are off for the night. Kun picks them up and they are the last ones to arrive, which apparently has been planned judging by the fact that their reserved table is decorated, if you can call 3 balloons and some drinks as prepared starters like that. Others let Taeil take a place in the middle of the connected furniture, Sicheng takes place next to Ten and Kun on the other side.

Everything flows nice, Sicheng has lost the count of how many times the toasts have been repeating the same “lets rise our glasses for Taeil”, but definitely enough to make everyone fairly drunk to have an awful hangover tomorrow. Somebody had also brought a cake, which has disappeared in seconds, but all Sicheng knows that it was damn great.

At one point Taeyong had disappeared together with Doyoung to go _home_ , giving a notice only to Kun, who maybe they thought could trust, but as soon as most of them returned by the table from dancing, he was quick to announce that Doyoung left with Taeyong to _fuck,_  which made everyone laugh and get dizzy even more. Sicheng tried to send Taeyong a message that their possible secret had been spread, but whatever he tried to type probably was understandable only to him. Not minding much, the boy leaves his phone on the table and goes to get another drink.

By the bar he meets the birthday boy himself. Sicheng knows he didn’t prepare any gift, so he decides to use this as a chance to at least pay for his friends drinks to what Taeil complains that it won’t be enough for making it up for forgetting about his special day.  They stand by the bar until both drinks are finished, then Taeil proceeds to link their arms and drag the other into the mass of people, closer to the speakers blasting loud music. Sicheng bumps into almost everyone he sees, but just laughs it off and hopes  that nobody will get hurt by his whereabouts.

When Taeil finds a spot he’s satisfied with, he turns back to facing Sicheng. They move their bodies to the rhythm of songs for a quite while, Sicheng can even feel his limbs get tired, with the amount of alcohol in his system only helping the cause. But he’s completely back to his senses when Taeil comes closer and wraps his arms around the boys shoulders, quickly moving to the neck next. It feels like hours and the weight of his friends arms keeps on growing, as if the god himself would try to push Sicheng into the ground. Surely, as a pair of friends they are extremely close, but they never have quite… stepped over the ‘best-friend’ zone lines. So even the small, but unusual contact is send Sichengs brain mixed signals. Should he just keep on dancing like seconds before? Or should he wrap his arms around Taeil too, his waist to be exact.

The short overthinking gets him all worked up and hot. His legs hurt and so will his head soon. Sicheng decides to clear his mind from any thoughts and just act on the moment.

But even that is thrown away, as it looks like in slow motion Taeils face is just getting closer and closer to his own. Sicheng isn’t able to hear any music anymore, only the bass hitting his ears and his heart thumping in his chest. The boys eyes go from round open to pushed closed as he waits for any kind of impact, his only guess being a kiss. He wonders if Taeil has stopped from leaning in and stares at him shocked, not understanding what the younger is thinking. _Fuck,_ did Sicheng just really thought Taeil would kiss _him? Fuck, fuck, fuck._ Sicheng gives himself a second to prepare for whatever mocking is going to come before opening his eyes.

All he sees is a flash of Taeils brown locks and his friends cheeks brushing against his own. It feels rougher than he would have expected, but it doesn’t mean that it feels bad. It feels unused and new. Sicheng’s shocked by how his own body is reacting to such a small thing, he’s completely frozen, waiting for what will come next, but also afraid of it.

It is quick, Taeil means no harm, “You look good today!” he whispers by Sichengs ear and doesn’t hesitate to lean back and take in his reaction. A weight drops from Sichengs chest, but not from his neck though.

Instead doing the same that his friend, the boy just tries to shout his answer over the loud music, “Yeah, but you look better!!!” ending it with a laugh, “You’re half fifty now!!!”

Taeils fake angry face expression sends Sicheng in even more giggles, which are interrupted by the same elders movements as seconds ago. “Have you thought about a name for the cat?” Tingles run down the younger spine from his friends cold breath hitting his sweaty skin behind his ear.

Sicheng actually thinks about it for a moment, but he hasn’t really put a finger on such a theme, hell, if he gives it as little time as a minute, he realises that they don’t even know if the kitten is a boy or a girl. Taeil still awaits for an answer, not minding to change the position they are in right and just continuing to move along with the now slower music nor taking his eyes off youngers face, curiously waiting with what he is going to come up with.

Now it’s Sichengs turn to lean in, to what Taeil reacts nowhere near as Sicheng did,  
“What’s your favourite berry?”

The boy doesn’t even have the time to move away, before his friend manages to give a joyful answer still by his ear, “Strawberry!”

“Then we’re naming it Strawberry!” Sicheng doesn’t bother moving up anymore and stays at the same place, not minding the discomfort as his cheek sticks to Taeils. Until a moment later the elder throws his head back in laughter, loosening his hold and soon they are completely detached from one another and making their way back, leaving the crowd behind them.

 

* * *

 

 

 

Sicheng sits at next to Kun who’s heatedly tapping on the boys phone. At first he didn’t pay much attention to it, there wasn’t really anything to hide or to be ashamed of.  Sicheng rests his head on Kuns shoulder and closes his eyes for a bit, in hopes to cure his tiredness. Another drink could help, but he’s too lazy to go and get some and there didn’t seems to be anything he’d like to have on the table.

“Why haven’t you told me about your boyfriend?” Sichengs doesn’t bat an eye about Kuns question. He thinks about dancing with Taeil earlier, but soon replaces that with dream that someone will take him home in the next hour or so and tuck him in his bed, so he could properly fall asleep.

“We aren’t dating.”

“He’s hot though.”

The younger can’t catch on about what Kun is thinking, but neither does he bother, “Yeah, he is…”

“How old is he?”

Sicheng isn’t sure anymore if Kun is even talking to him, they all are here to celebrate Taeils 25th birthday. Maybe he had too much to drink, “…Twenty five?”

“Oh!” Kun startles happily, making Sichengs head slide down a little bit, now his temple uncomfortably pressing against one of his bones, “He’s the same age as Taeil!”

At that the younger wakes up and goes back to sitting properly, trying to make out whatever his friend is trying to write on his phone. The dizzy head and blurred vision, which probably are effects from the drinks and the lack of fresh air in this place, doesn’t let him to make out a single letter Kun is pressing, so he leans closer to inspect the screen.

First thing that he notices is Yutas name on top of the screen, then the many texts he definitely wasn’t the one to send. His mind doesn’t send any alerts to the body, so he just keeps staring at Kuns fingers jumping between the different letters, forming more confronting sentences than Sicheng had been used to.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i can't stop listening to say it by one and only wayv , send help
> 
> also i found out that Sicheng can't quite cook, so that's a thing


	14. Chapter 14

_ok I get it_

_you believe in one and only for the rest of your  
life love, but_

_whats up with people who go as far as getting  
married and then break up after a while?_

_or people who cheat? And even when they beg forgiveness  
of their partner, receive it and then cheat again?_

_I think that in such situation that wasn’t true_  
_love_  
_I still believe that committing to marriage truly_  
_means that you want to spend your life with_  
_the person_  
_And I think that it’s okay to say no to a proposal_

_I find falling in love and being in love two different  
things_

_When you fall in love, small troubles can easily put  
an end to your story_

_But when youre in love, I believe you need to share your  
burdens and you two can overcome them_

Whatever Kun is typing seems to be too complicated to Sicheng, he knows they’re talking about love or something around it, but he can’t quite put a finger on it why Kun is texting as such. He guesses that his friend still thinks about his ex-girlfriend. He was ready to marry her and then one day he helps her out with leaving their shared apartment. There’s no way he managed to completely shut away from any kind of break-up signs. Kun talks about his problems, but tends to keeps his face clear of any emotions when he does such, neither Sicheng ever asks how he feels about them. Maybe Kun is drinking his sadness away and maybe he is trying to talk about his sentiments with Yuta, just not exposing them straight away.

“Are you okay?” Sicheng asks. This definitely isn’t the best setting to try and break into Kuns mind and make him release whatever is piled up inside of him, but at this point he doesn’t really care.

Kun turns his head to look at Sicheng with a questioning expression, “Yeah?”

 

_And what about secrets? What if the other or you  
want to keep a secret? Is that selfish? But secrets stay secrets_

_That can turn into a burden_

_You cant overcome all burdens_

 

He isn’t sure what kind of answer he expected, but any would leave him unsure for the next move, “You can talk to me.”

Kun still isn’t sure what Sicheng is hinting on, “Yeah, we do it all the time.”  
Sichengs neck and shoulders are getting tired, he repositions his elbow on the table and rests his check against his palm. Kun leans down completely, crossing his arms on the table before resting his head on them and closing his eyes. He leaves the phone between himself and Sicheng.

_Keeping secrets isn’t wrong_

_You know white lies? I think theres a line  
to draw with those too_

_I don’t want to get married now, I want to  
get past the falling in love phases_

_…and I think you shouldn’t get married too_

_…if that’s what this is about_

Sicheng nudges Kuns arm to give a notice about the new messages. His friend lifts his head and quickly scans over the new text boxes with blank expression. The elder goes back to resting, leaving Sicheng to give Yuta an answer.

The messaging app is open all the time and Yuta can see when his texts have been read. Sicheng thinks about saying that it wasn’t him who has sent the previous messages, he doesn’t even know what is in the older ones. He seems to blank out, thinking about nothing, until another messages is received.

_You really are getting married??????_

Sicheng tries his best to type an answer back that he isn’t getting married, nowhere near it. His left hand isn’t working good enough and the alcohol only makes it worse. It takes another minute before pressing the send button.

_im not marrying anyone……_

_thats good_

_I guess_

Any proper new things to text doesn’t come into his mind and Sicheng doesn’t bother to put any thought in it. He leaves it like that, taking interest in Kuns brown hair instead. He looks like he is sleeping or very close to it. His shoulders are rising and falling in an even pace, making his locks move ever so slightly. Sichengs hand is starting to move towards Kun, but another message stops him.

_what are you doing rn?_

_nothing much_

He goes back to paying attention to Kun. He lets his left hand rest against his friend, so the palm would be at the back of Kuns head. As soon as the hair caresses his skin, Sichengs fingers stretch out and start to softly rub his friends head. Kun falls deeper into his hands and that’s about it for his response. Kuns hair doesn’t feel as soft as Taeils. Or Tens. It’s way darker, but you can see some lighter spots from the old times when he went almost blonde. However, Sicheng keeps the small act. He zones out again, staring off somewhere and moving his fingers. This would be a good point to put an end for this night. Some more people have disappeared, nor is the birthday boy himself seen around.

Sicheng thinks how strange he and Kun probably look right now. The table is full of glasses, napkins and some forgotten lighters. He knows that Kun is tired and drunk, maybe sad, but for others he might seems completely destroyed, sucked out. Maybe crying in his arms while a friend or a stranger tries to comfort him, while himself being not in the best state.

“I think I’m going home.” Kun lifts his head, so his face wouldn’t be hidden, but still keeps it on his arms, not minding the free massage yet.

“Yeah, me too.”

“Don’t you need to wait for Taeil?”

Sicheng turns to look on the dancing people again, Taeil doesn’t pop into his sight and he doesn’t bother looking more for him, “I haven’t seen him for a while,” he turns back and stretches his arms, then turns his head around to get rid of the tiredness settled in his neck, “he might have gone home. Or somewhere else.”

Kun starts to move around too, sighing and grunting, “Without you? I don’t think so.”

Sicheng starts to slide out of their bench, giving Kun a disapproving look.

The elder copies his friend, patting his pockets to check if he hasn’t left anything. “What? You two were like- like a step from dating, but noo… Too stubborn.” Sicheng is already on his feet, while Kun a slip away from the end of the furniture. He looks up to the younger, who seems not to be listening to what Kun has to say, “But that Yuta guy! That’s the same dude from that long letter weeks back, right?” He has stopped from moving and grins at Sicheng. “Right! He gives a fuck about you too! _And_ he’s hot… maybe I should get into guys too.” He gets up and stands next to Sicheng, both taking in everything for the last time before leaving.

They’re interrupted when the phone in Sichengs hand lights up. He lifts his hand and turns it around and right there on the screen Yutas name is displayed, with that dumb picture of a face-swap he did with his dog.

Kun chuckles, “Speak of the devil.”

Sicheng stares at his screen almost dumbfounded, thinking if this is a good environment to pick up the call and can he even hold a proper conversation in this state. Maybe he could, maybe not, but he surely feels too lazy and sleepy to answer Yuta. Until Kun manages to sneak his finger way too close to Sichengs phone and swipes his fingertip on the screen. They share a look, Kun smiling suspiciously and Sicheng just blankly looking back.

Yuta manages to say something that none of the two hears, then Sicheng brings the phone to his ear and turns up the volume, so he could hear the rest over the loud music. Kun quickly hooks his arm over Sichengs and slowly starts to drag them towards the exit, keeping himself close enough to hear what his friend is going to talk about.

“It doesn’t sound like you’re not doing much…” Yuta drags, his tone sounding almost offended, making Sicheng gulp harder.

He hangs his head lower and tells the truth, “I’m out- I’m in a club…” Sicheng notices how good Kun is at manoeuvring between the strangers. “Sorry.”

“There’s nothing to be sorry for. I just wanted to make sure that you’re okay.” Sichengs drunk mind can’t come up with a proper response and Yuta beats him to it. “Are you alone?”

He looks at Kun again, who still is clinging onto him, then thinks about the rest of the group at the start of the night, “No, I’m with Kun. Now.” The mentioned man turns his head by hearing his name, doesn’t ask anything.

“Who’s Kun?”

Sichengs sighs, has he really never talked about Kun? “Kun is my friend and we’re going home.” Kun silently mimics Sichengs answer.

“You are going to Kuns place?”

“No… Kun is going home and, and I’m going to my home.”

Yuta hums approvingly, but still doesn’t seem to be convinced enough, “Call a taxi, don’t go home alone. It’s very late, you know that? Are you drunk?”

“Mmmm…” The boy drags it for a second, rethinking about the fact that he should call a cab for himself and another one for Kun. And what time is it? He has no clue, except for the fact that the sky is as dark as it gets during summer and that they’ve spent solid hours in this building. “I’m getting two taxis and… I don’t know what time it is and I probably am!” Sicheng laughs at the end.

“Sicheng,” Yutas serious tone takes Sicheng aback and his cheerfulness dies down a little bit, “It’s almost half past three. Just don’t stay outside alone, okay?”

Kun has dragged them almost to the exit, “Yeah, don’t worry about me. You should go to sleep.” They stand by the doors, Kun is shaking his head in order to sober up, which seems funny to Sicheng and he laughs again.

Yutas voice doesn’t seem to be as clear as seconds ago, “I’m anything, but sleep now. I thought your secret spouse or something left you.” He can hear him sigh. Kun opens the door, sending a smile to a staff member.

“I’m not planning on getting married,” Sicheng can tell that Yuta is loosening up by the way he, just like his mom, sarcastically mutters _I hope so_ , “don’t worry about those messages.”

The fresh air feels unbelievably good, he eyes Kun who takes a few dramatic breaths and turns back to looking at the streets in front of him. Sicheng can’t wait to arrive at home and slip under the covers in his bed. But he can’t get a transport to pick him up until he keeps talking to Yuta.

“Yeah, but y’now… I care about you-- about your well-being.”

Kun is pulling out his own phone, Sicheng believes to call an over-worked taxi driver at this hell of an hour and motions to get a separate one for him too.

Sicheng doesn’t see a point of having such a serious conversation in this state, he probably won’t remember a thing Yuta had said to him and doesn’t want to finally talk about things he usually doesn’t and forget it too. Kun pinches his leg and when Sicheng looks down, his friend is patting the space next to him on the pavement to sit down.

Sicheng does so, “Thank you, I care about you too. I hope you know that.” He doesn’t give the time for Yuta to answer and changes the theme, “What are you doing right now?” The concrete under him feels uncomfortable and too cool for his liking.

“I took my dog for an extra walk like an hour ago,” The boy shifts around, trying to get into more pleasant position. “and since that pretty much nothing. Just like you.” They both share a laugh. Kun turns to him looking awry, still with a phone by his ear, trying to get them home.

An easy silence falls between them and now it’s only Kun who’s talking, trying to explain where they currently are and the, now quiet, music coming from the club way behind them. Sicheng looks up to the sky and reminds himself of one of the downsides of moving here – the stars can’t be seen through the layer of smog that covers the city. If he thinks about it for a second, Sicheng can’t even remember the last time he looked up and saw something more than a moon and clouds. An idea pops in his mind and he turns to his friend, ready to offer spending a few days somewhere outside the city, but Yuta speaks first.

“By the way, have you decided about… meeting me?”

If he would have asked this any other time, Sichengs senses would be alert, but by the way last hours have gone by, he doesn’t hesitate even a little bit, “Yeah, yeah in like-- like yes, I want to see you.”

He’s still looking at Kun, who now is looking back and judging by his interested face, he understood what they are talking about on the phone.

Yutas voice comes out almost surprised, “Oh! That’s cool, great, yeah.” But it’s able to hear that he’s smiling, probably just as Sicheng himself is. This moment feels different from reality, not like he’s dreaming, but the whole setting, the people around him and the events from today, yesterday – it just feels too good to be true. “I expect at least three coffees for free from your café.”

“Don’t forget about the cakes!” Sicheng adds.

“Ah,” Yuta drags, pretending to be whining, “cakes are full of sugar. I’ll have to push myself twice as hard on the field then.”

“Aw, poor you! Isn’t that your dream job?”

“What, eating cakes?”

 Sicheng bursts out in laughter, leaning himself down until his whole back is touching the pavement, but he’s quickly sitting straight again, when he hears Taeils voice coming from behind him and Kun, calling Sicheng enthusiastically. He looks at Taeils form slowly approaching them, smile plastered on his face.

“Hey, sorry. I—I have to go.”

Yuta sighs on the other end, “Okay, just stay safe. And text me when you get home, okay?”

Sicheng nods, “Okay. Bye.”

“Bye Sicheng!”

Sicheng hears the beeping coming from his phone mixing with Taeils banter as he nears the sitting pair. The boy puts his phone away, but none of them bother getting up from the pavement.

“Oh, we thought you left.” Kun speaks up slowly.

Taeil’s standing behind them and looking up to him really gives Sichengs neck a hard time. Taeil scrunches his face and squats down with way too much energy, “Why would I leave alone?”

Nobody really answers his question, but Sicheng gives another one back, “Did somebody stay?”

“Yeah, I think Ten, but he can go all night. But. I. Am. Tired.” Taeil emphasises each word and throws his arms around each males shoulders. “I saw you two leave, but by the time I got ready to go, I thought you two would’ve been gone!”

Kun looks down on the ground, “I forgot this address and spent like five minutes trying to get a taxi here.”

“A taxi? What about your car?” Oh, right, Kun took them here, Sicheng didn’t even think about that.

Kun looks back up, pretending to be prying, “On god, if somebody steals it, I’ll cry for a year. If not, then I’ll pick it up right from that spot,” His finger points to the parking space, where the car is, “later today.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> "I hOpE tO fInIsH tHiS bY tHe StArT oF tHe SuMmEr" ha lol


	15. Chapter 15

 

 

The transport arrives not too long after. Sicheng’s happy that he won’t recall the drivers face when two drunk adults got into the back of his car, he really doesn’t envy those people. The drive feels shorter than usually, but the amount of stairs they have to take to get up to their apartment seems to have drained any energy that had left.

As soon as the door to their apartment is open, Sicheng rushes past Taeil and falls down on the sofa, throwing his shoes off somewhere on the way. He doesn’t remember the last time the furniture has felt this soft and welcoming. Taeil seems to have had the same plan judging by the way Sicheng feels the sofa sink next to his head. His legs are hanging over the armrest, the rest of the body covering half of the sofa, with eyes closed he can tell that another head has appeared next to his own. He hears Taeil sigh deeply.

“Half-fifty huh.”

“Half forty-two huh.”

Taeil chuckles, making the surface they’re laying on shake lightly. If Sicheng keeps his eyes closed, soon enough he’ll be fully asleep in this uncomfortable position.

“I forgot to get you a gift!” Sicheng wails and shuffles around to get more cozy.

“I won’t forgive you that!” The elder pretends to be hurt and by the movement, Sicheng guesses that he has crossed his arms now.

The boy fidgets some more and now is laying on his back, opening his eyes and staring at the ceiling, trying to look some more for stars. A sudden urge to turn his head to the right and look at his friend washes over. He doesn’t suppress it and calmly glances at Taeil, whose eyes are closed, Sicheng wonders if people truly can feel it when somebody’s looking at them.  

Maybe they can, Sicheng still is looking at his friend when his eyes shot open and Taeil sits up straight, “Strawberry!” looks at the cat bed, where, indeed, Strawberry is sleeping and gets up, disappearing into the kitchen.

Sicheng sits up himself and confused looks at the kitten. Strawberrys food bowls aren’t empty, neither is the water one. He honestly doesn’t know with what Taeil just came up, but it’s way too early for Taeil to cook and for them both to eat. Not mentioning the chances of nausea after that. He thinks about going and stopping Taeil, but the sound of something closing and opening in the other room wakes up the kitty and to Sicheng it seems way more interesting.

The kitten stretches in its small bed, slowly blinking, trying to wake up. It spares a glance to the boy and jumps out of the bed, only to get to the food, not taking any other notices of Sichengs presence. He changes his position to sit properly, bending his knees to his chest and resting the head against the backrest.

Sicheng closes his eyes for a second, not minding Taeils footsteps approaching him, not even the feeling of him sitting right next to the boy doesn’t make him budge. That is until seconds later Taeil is whining that Sicheng shouldn’t fall sleep yet, as they haven’t had the cake.

The boy opens his eyes and lifts his head in protest that they actually had a cake, which randomly appeared back at the club, but Taeil fires back with the fact that it wasn’t even good and definitely not his favourite flavour.

“Strawberry ones are the best!” Taeil lifts up the cake from his lap, which Sicheng recognizes as the cake they bought a few days back. “And its expiration date is coming up.”

Sicheng would have said no to pretty much anything at this point, but seems like not to a pink coloured cake. Taeil is already working on opening the packaging, there’s no going back.

“We’re missing the tea.’’ Realization hits the younger, the sentence comes out way more serious than is the situation.

But Taeil looks back just as genuinely concerned, “Do you want to make them?”

“Not really.” Sicheng scrunches his face at the thought of getting up and wandering around the kitchen, all he wants is some cake and then immediately – sleep.

“Yeah, me neither.” Taeil chuckles and takes off the plastic lid covering the dessert.

The sweet scent beats all of the savoury cocktails they have had previously. Sicheng leans closer in carving and Taeil wastes no time after he puts the lid down next to him. He turns back, still holding the cake on shoulder level between them with the other hand. Sichengs gaze keeps drifting between the sweet and Taeils face, trying to figure out his friends next move.

All fingers, except the index one, folds down on Taeils free hand and he slowly dips it in the pink icing, twisting it around to get on as much as possible. Sicheng keeps following the finger, even when it leaves the top of the cake and Taeil brings it to his lips without any hurry. It lingers there, right in front of his mouth and the boy looks back to his friends face, eyes again. He’s looking down on the pink substance that is dangerously close to falling off of his finger, but the elder soon realises that Sicheng is looking at him and dares to look back. The way Taeil gazes into Sicheng feels so innocent and fierce, digging deep behind his brown iris.

Sicheng can’t see exactly how the candy disappears behind the pink lips of his friend, but the second Taeils eyes close, the younger loudly exhales a deep breath which, surprisingly to himself, he has been holding. The next audible thing in the room is the muffled moan coming from the other. For a second nothing happens, expect Sicheng looking at the way his roommate is working his own finger clean and it makes the boy feel just as dirty as it sounds. _He wants a taste too._

He repositions himself even closer, resting his chest against Taeils side, who at the contact shots the eyes open, but now his look has a glint of something Sicheng can put into words, but it sends nice shivers down his body. Only then Taeil lets his finger slide out of the mouth and he breaks their gazes to pick up some more of the icing using the same finger, he picks up way less than previously, but the small amount still can make Sichengs mouth water. His mouth automatically opens, awaiting to get even a little bit of the sweetness. Taeil moves his digit upward almost teasingly slow, Sicheng follows it, Taeil follows Sicheng. It lingers right in front of his lips for a moment, giving the boy a chance to change his mind and pretend to be grossed out. But to back out is the last thing Sicheng wants to do now, so he bends forwards and wraps his lips around Taeils fingertip by himself. He closes his eyes in satisfaction, not witnessing the mischievous look on his friends face.  
Sicheng dares to press his tongue flat underneath the index finger and drag it gently, collecting the icing. Once he doesn’t feel any of the dessert left, Sicheng relaxes his jaw and slightly moves away, letting the finger leave his lips. The boy takes a second to enjoy the taste in his mouth.

Opening his eyes without a hurry, Sichengs voice comes out way more husky and breathy than he expected, “It’s so good.” 

Taeils unfolds his fingers and lets his hand down, resting it on top of the other thigh, adding pressure to it as he shifts his weight to this arm. Sicheng can feel each finger squeezing his leg separately, every digit seems to be radiating warm, making his skin feels hot underneath the layer of clothes and as longer his palm lays there, the more heated strings reach his lower abdomen. The feeling makes him impatient, Sicheng either wants more or nothing, but Taeil apparently has stopped at the thigh, not doing anything else for long seconds.

Sicheng knows Taeil shows his affection a lot and often takes it so far that some would think he likes them in a romantic way. But he doesn’t, he’s just clingy and touchy. And usually it would click together in Sichengs brain and he would back off, because months back he was too deeply in love with his roommate and any moments of being close would be remind him about the fact that he isn’t loved the way he loves him. And it would hurt in that exact moment, later when he goes to sleep, maybe even when he dreams about it during the night and day. He would carry the weight with him everywhere, it just wouldn’t leave him. He would think about it while bored in classes or busy in job, imagining different endings of each one.

But at some point it would get too much and the emotions he keeps locked in his mind, would start to come out. People would notice how quickly his mood would change or how he would avoid going out with friends as much as possible, but no one really asks why, because such things happen to everyone. Sicheng isn’t a special butterfly and he knows that. That’s why, just like many other people do, he breaks at one point and spends a sleepless night sulking and crying about how shitty his life seems in the moment. And even though then it feels awful, he knows that after one night he’ll feel relatively good again and whatever happened will be left behind. He is going to feel good again and let himself enjoy everything Taeil does to him without a hesitation for a few days, until it starts to hurt again.

However, this time Sicheng wants more and in his eyes Taeil isn’t backing away either. He doesn’t want anything slow anymore, it’s starting to get on his nerves. Since Taeil hasn’t removed his hand from the boy, Sicheng allows himself to rest his own arm between the sofas backrest and his friends side. He doesn’t know if he has been looking in Taeils eyes all the time, but only now he takes in the way his friend is looking back with hooded eyes and an unusual glint in them. They are brown, so, so dark brown that they suck Sicheng in like a black hole, even if he wanted to stop he couldn’t. The boy leans closer without even noticing, he can’t blame himself, he wants to get even closer, dig through the brown colour in front of him. Sicheng places his free palm against Taeils cheek, his thumb right under his friends eye. The boy softly brushes the finger on elders skin, to what Taeil responds with leaning his head in the hand cupping it. Sicheng wonders how such an adult can keep his skin _that_ nice to touch, the thought makes him smile. Taeil squints his eyes slightly from his own smile and the other can feel the way his cheek moves against the palm of his hand.

Then it feels too long again and Sicheng takes it in his own hands. He forgets about the deep eyes and closes his own, shuts his mind from any negative thoughts and takes one last breath before. And it’s happening, for real this time. He can actually feel it this time, he can feel Taeils lips against his own. They’re just there for a second, no movements, until Sicheng shifts them again and he can feel Taeil opening his own, but it doesn’t feel like enough yet. The younger stops again for a moment, only to squeeze the cheek in his palm and move again, Sicheng succeeds and can clearly tell that, with the third time, Taeil is kissing back. If the sensation of their lips connecting was over the roof, then _actually_ kissing is the heaven itself. Sure, Sicheng has kissed people before, but no one has made him feel like this. Others can make him forget what was on his mind and replace it with lust, but this time even with a kiss it would be enough, the tingling feeling of butterflies in his stomach at this moment is better than sleeping with someone. He can taste the strawberry flavour on his tongue, not sure if it’s his own.  
They move so much in sync that it feels like it has been done before, maybe it’s just Sichengs brain telling him that his fantasies are coming true and making it feel way better than it is.

Sicheng can feel that he’s starting to move more fiercely, brushing Taeils cheek and jaw in the process, but he’s not the only one, Taeil’s just as responsive as he himself. He is lightly massaging youngers thigh, sometimes almost reaching his hips, his body is leaning closer to Sichengs, not to mention the tries of catching Sichengs lower lip with his teeth. Not much time has passed, but it feels like a lot has been done.

His palm accidently touches Taeils ear and he manages to whine inbetween the kisses, Sicheng takes it as a signal to do that again. He takes his time moving his hand from the elders chin upwards his ear and once his fingers brush against the sensitive skin, Taeils _visibly_ relaxes and huffs, although the hand holding Sichengs hip down now becomes rock hard.  
Taeil harshly bites on Sichengs lip again, this time it actually hurt, making him wince in pain, wanting to pull away, but the other does it first.

“Fuck. _Fuck, shit!_ ” That’s all Taeil says as he looks down and when Sicheng does the same he remembers the cake in his friends lap, now in slow motion falling off its original place onto the floor. They both are quick to reattach from each other in an attempt to save the dessert form being crushed.

Sichengs hand barely touches it, but enough for the cake to turn a little bit and fall with the packaging down. It partly lands on Taeils foot and they both audibly exhale, still out of breath from the previous action. They just look at the cake for a moment, before moving their heads at the same time and locking their eyes again.  
Sicheng expected to be somewhat ashamed or at least shy, but the fact that his friend is laughing quietly makes him relax and grin on his own.

They fall back, crashing against the soft sofa, but just for a second. Taeil takes a short inhale and yells suppressing his voice, “Strawberry!” He looks back down to the floor and Sicheng copies him.

There are _Strawberries_ , one fully sitting on Taeils foot, hungrily looking at the other one. Taeil takes the kitten in his hands before it presses its paw in the pink icing, meanwhile Sicheng picks up the cake, catching the two forks from the coffee table. The boy curls his legs underneath him, the other lets Strawberry lay in his lap. The cat is shuffling around, trying to find a good position for sleep and Taeil is trying to pet his soft fur in the process. While Sicheng eyes the animal, Taeil steals one of the utensils from his hand and digs into the sweet cake.

 The elder stuffs his mouth with a satisfied groan, the big piece of food making it hard to pronounce words, “It’s really fucking good.”

Sicheng himself takes a piece and once it enters his mouth, he already feels full and ready to go sleep. He hums in agreement with Taeil, slowly munching on the wet piece in his mouth and throwing looks towards the kitten. _Strawberry_. “Strawberry.”

“Talking about the cake or the cat?” Taeil asks, sounding as tired as Sicheng feels.

He laughs before responding, “I don’t know.” The boy takes another piece and eats it, he doesn’t carve the sweetness anymore, but it isn’t bad. “Do you want more?”

Taeil shakes his head with a foolish smile, both understanding that opening up the cake was a waste. He gives his fork to Sicheng, who puts the utensils and the cake back on the coffee table. Luckily to them, they’ve left a comforter on the couch and Sicheng reaches for that, unfolding it while getting into a comfortable position for sleep. Taeil carefully lifts Strawberry from his lap, so Sicheng could put the cover over him. The boy does so, leaving the smaller part to himself, he lets his legs free, stretching them as much as possible in the tiny space. Taeil moves around a little bit and settles the cat back in his lap, who seems not to mind spending the rest of the night there. Some cushions are placed around them, Taeil comfortably places his head on Sichengs shoulder and Sicheng rests his own on top of it.  
Just like they used to do.

**Author's Note:**

> waddup, english isn`t my first nor second language, so if the wording of sentences are strange or I`ve used the wrong word in the wrong place, please forgive me :,(  
> 


End file.
